


Geyser

by willowisp (Dynatillo)



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Aged Up, Angst, Deviates From Canon, Drama, F/F, Forbidden Love, LGBTQ Themes, Pining, Post-Season/Series 01, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Sexual Content, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Smut, Will add more tags as I go, time skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2019-09-14 20:04:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 23,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16919502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dynatillo/pseuds/willowisp
Summary: Following the Battle of Brightmoon, the war for the future of Etheria has become a grim deadlock. Hordak plans to break the stalemate by manipulating Catra and leveraging her complex relationship with Adora, in an attempt to bring the latter back to the Fright Zone. But none of the major powers of Etheria are ready for the consequences of Catra infiltrating Castle Brightmoon - as the bond between Adora and Catra develops, both of their allegiances will be tested, and neither will see the world as they once did.





	1. A Symbol of Hope

**Author's Note:**

> Listen to the soundtrack or don't - it's mostly just whatever I was listening to while writing. Lots of pop for adora scenes and lots of rnb for catra scenes. The one piece of required listenening is Mitski's Geyser, which inspired the whole series. It's short. Just listen to it. The link is at the start of episode one.
> 
> This is my first time posting on Ao3. If it make a mistake, let me know :))))))) enjoy the ride

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adora thinks of her past and pursues a rumour into the woods.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zdFZJf-B90 

As the dust settled over Brightmoon, it became tacitly clear that the effects of the Black Garnet Storm would be felt for years to come.  
Etheria had been rebalanced, but even the scant hours it had spent off its axis had been disastrous - the whispering wood remained prone to sudden blizzards, Salineas was forced to adapt to a rising sea, and incessant, bloody forks of lightning eventually grounded Mystacore; the city choosing only to brave the sky when necessary.

Adora had repelled the Horde in the eleventh hour of the Battle of Brightmoon, but had little idea how she had done it, and struggled to find a way to restore whispering wood to its full power. Eventually, she began her training with Light Hope, but progress was slow, and difficult, and Adora found communicating with Light Hope strange, occasionally, for reasons she could never quite explain.

Hordak, hungry to press the advantage, did not give the Rebellion time to celebrate. A slow waltz of attrition drove back and forth along the borders of Brightmoon for months, even allowing the Horde to clear some sections of the wood, building footholds to stage further advances. Adora and her friends were forced to grow up fast. 

Catra, following her promotion, fought with redoubled zeal for the horde - in the years that crawled by, her every encounter with Adora was tenser than the last.  
Both of them suffered for it. Their rivalry ground away at them physically, mentally. Emotionally. They took their status as legends in the war with two hands. 

Adora watched her own breath a moment, as it crystallised into cold cones in the sweet balcony air. A storm was not long passed, and the sky felt scoured clean by it - a brief respite from the usual cloud cover. Thick purple and orange twisted in the sunset above.  
A memory crept up her back. A night in the Fright Zone. She’d called Brightmoon home for almost as long, now.  
Even so, the whenever the Fright Zone was on her mind she tried to avoid it’s gaze. For years, she’d ignored the feeling that the dire city wanted her back.  
“Adora?”  
She jumped, turned. “Glimmer. You startled me.”  
“Sorry,” Glimmer teleported to the balcony rail and sat atop it. “You okay out here?”  
Glimmer had been at court all day, and wore a deep plum gown with a silver flower curling up one shoulder. Adora had been training, and wore pants, a shirt, and gloves - and felt a touch underdressed. She’d begun to adjust to the wardrobes preferred by princesses.  
“Sure,” said Adora, hoping it was true. “Just needed some fresh air.”  
“From the meeting? You love meetings. Sometimes we hold them just for you.” Adora laughed, but despite making the joke, Glimmer’s concern held fast. “Are you sure there’s nothing wrong?”  
Adora had no desire to keep secrets. “Just the usual.”  
“Still thinking about her, huh?”  
Adora had told Glimmer about her complicated relationship with Catra years ago. She’d had to to survive it.  
“No, I’m- trying not to.”  
“Why not?”  
Adora felt the weight of the world in her mouth. “Too busy.”  
“Mm,” Glimmer said in empathy. “Well, you know I’m always around to talk. Or listen, I mean.”  
“Thanks, Glimmer.”  
“No problem!” They hugged a brief moment. “Come back in whenever you’re ready - apparently there’s something you need to hear.”  
“I’ll just be a minute.” Adora turned her back on Castle Brightmoon and looked out across the world. The Moonstone pulsed softly from it’s tower in the lake, casting roky light in a halo - she closed her eyes and watched it across her eyelids, one of which was darkened forever. She traced a hand over the five, slender rivers in her face, sweeping from her jaw to her brow.  
Hey Adora  
Adora shivered. She hadn’t seen Catra in months, and a dull ache hung in the hollow behind her heart. She knew why, but she wished she didn’t.  
Adora couldn’t decide which she hated more - seeing Catra, or being apart from her. Without the war, maybe she’d have moved on. With it, Adora found her heart constantly at odds with both the ideals of war she’d been born into, and her newfound sense of ethics. Pining for the enemy was a strange weakness, one that Hordak would have destroyed her for, and one that Adora could only hope the Rebellion never knew about. Adora thought only one thing certain, out on that cold balcony. That Catra did not feel the same way.  
Adora went inside, returned to the meeting. 

The meeting was a small one. Princess Glimmer sat at the side of her mother, Queen Angella. Adora and Glimmer’s close friend, Commander Bow, was stretched out across the war table, balanced on a toe tip and a palm, pointing at something a little out of his reach.  
“-right there.”  
“You’re certain,” Angella said, her high, even-keeled accent carrying through the hologram of Etheria that spun delicately over the table. The map re-organized itself to look specifically at the valley Bow pointed at. “This one?”  
‘That’s the one,” Bow confirmed. “I got scouts telling me it’s been spotted there.”  
“What’s been spotted where?” Adora asked.  
“Adora!” Bow said, “Great timing you funky little lesbian.”  
“Bow-” Angella said, a hand on the bridge of her nose. “We’ve talked about formality in meetings.”  
“Oh! We totally have. Sorry, your Majesty. It’s staying super serious when it’s just the best friend squad in meetings.”  
“Plus myself,” the Queen said, not without a tiny chip of mirth. “And you do know these meetings are all recorded for other Rebellion commanders, don’t you?”  
“They are?”  
“In any case - refrain from referring to Commander Adora in such a manner.”  
“What?” Bow said. “Why? It’s true.” They looked at Adora.  
“I mean, it is true,” Adora said.  
Angella shrugged. “Kids- call each other what you like. Let’s not get distracted. Commander Adora was asking about the creature.”  
“Yes!” Bow pointed at the valley. “Take it away Glimmer.”  
Glimmer stretched out her hands, which glittered with a corona of purple and pink. A handful of markers on the war-table shimmered in a cloud of power and lifted - Glimmer’s telekinesis split them up and started dropping them on the map. She bit her tongue in concentration.  
Bow carried on, “these are the three most recent sightings of something nasty we’ve heard of attacking settlements in the whispering wood. We don’t have anything more on it, other than eyewitness testimony, and all of that is… upsetting.”  
“Upsetting how?” Adora asked.  
“So far people have been describing it as ‘made of shadows,’ so, like…”  
Adora crossed her arms. “We don’t think Shadow Weaver’s behind it, do we?”  
“We don’t know either way,” Queen Angella said. “It could be her, or something she made for Hordak years ago.”  
Adora bit her lip. “When are we going?”  
“Bow and Glimmer are going tomorrow,” the Queen answered. “You will stay.”  
The trio looked up at Angella as one. “What?”  
“She-Ra stays. Dignitaries are starting to arrive for the war effort gala. They want to meet you. I know diplomacy isn’t your forte-”  
“-It’s not!” Adora pleaded. “Please, Your Majesty-”  
“This meeting is adjourned, Commanders. Glimmer. I need a word with you outside.” Angella spoke calmly, not overbearing, and with a solid, unbroken eye on Adora. “I’m sorry,” she said genuinely, “but my decision on the matter is absolutely final.”  
Glimmer left with her mother, shooting them both an apologetic glance.  
Bow blinked at Adora. “How long until you leave?”  
“I’ll go tonight,” she said.  
“I’ll cover for you for a while, but you know you won’t get away with it for long.”  
“Thank you Bow,” Adora smiled at her friend, and they set off in the hallways together.  
“You better not get caught though. Girl, I mean it. If the gala gets called off what are we going to do with our plans?”  
“We can always drink alone,” Adora said, mostly joking.  
“Psh- no. Your ish is not that bad. And if i’m getting white-girl wasted I’m going to do it with a white girl.”  
The lacquered hallways flowed around them, carpeted in white and blue and gold. Adora began to make her way toward the stables, and they slowed as Bow reached the hallway up to his room. “Hey-” he said. “Be careful, Adora. You’ve been throwing yourself to the wolves a lot lately- your ish is pretty bad. I get it. I mean, it’s different for you than me - Catra isn’t straight - but-”  
“She could be! I don’t even know!”  
“Girl no, we’ve been through this. One, after everything you’ve told Glimmer and I there’s no way that’s true, and two, I would know. Look, what I mean is, don’t self-destruct over her, okay? We need you too.”  
“All of Etheria needs me, Bow... It’s a lot of pressure sometimes.”  
“That’s fair but that’s my point I guess - you’ve got us to help you. We all need each other. Just don’t forget us.”  
She gave him a hug. “I couldn’t ever forget you or Glimmer, after everything we’ve been through.”  
“Okay,” he said, squirming under the iron weight of Adora’s biceps. “That’s what I wanted to hear. Please let me live-”  
Adora let him go apologetically, and they parted ways. Adora turned, breaking into a light jog, shoes squeaking on marble steps.

“Switfy?” she called into the stables.  
His distant reply came from the far end. “Adora!”  
“Where are you?”  
“In horse jail, apparently.”  
“Swift Wind, we’ve been over this. It’s not horse jail.” She found the winged unicorn in a stall across the room.  
“Oh so all these horses just love it here, huh? That’s not what they tell me.”  
She ran a hand down his nose. “You know I’ve talked to Angella about this! Focus on the war first. We have to go, anyway.”  
“We do?” he said, excited. “Where? Why? Can I fly? I’ve been so cooped up in here I thought i was going to do something crazy, like bust the door down and like- light everything on fire.”  
Adora pushed the door open with her foot and started saddling him. “You wouldn’t. Would you?”  
“Well- I mean. Not if it was going to put you in danger.”  
“It probably would.”  
“Noted. Do you have the sword?”  
“Shoot!”  
“You know, for something so important, you do leave it behind a lot.”  
“I do not!”  
“Oh really? What about the time-” Adora pulled a strap tight and Swift Wind coughed. “Aak! Jeez! I’ll drop it!”  
“Just meet me outside you handsome idiot - I’ll get my things.”  
“Handsome! Guess I have to do what you say now.”  
“Also because I gave you sentience.”  
“Let’s not get into that.”  
The horse trotted outside, and Adora stole back upstairs, found the Sword of Protection under her bed, after a few breathless minutes of tossing laundry around, and started her descent back down.  
Queen Angella was waiting in the hall for her.  
“Adora,” she said, and Adora froze.  
“Queen Angella! I- uh-”  
“Walk with me,” the Queen said, and Adora did as she was bid. 

“I can explain,” Adora started, as she followed the Queen’s passage through the halls of Castle Brightmoon.  
“You don’t need to,” Angella said wearily. “You know, I am beginning to think it’s nearly time for me to hand the Rebellion over to you.”  
Adora’s breath caught. “I couldn’t lead- I mean- I have no idea what-”  
“And yet you act as though you are in charge.”  
Adora felt a little guilty. Queen Angella did deal with a lot of bureaucracy on Adora’s behalf. Angella went on: “Perhaps that’s unfair. I don’t mean to chide you, but you must understand - you are a figurehead of our movement. Everything you do matters. I should know better than to try to control you or command you, but when I do, it’s because I need to manage the Rebellion’s optics; how we appear to the public of Etheria from the outside.”  
“I understand, your Majesty.”  
“And one day you will take over this Rebellion. She-Ra may be the only one who can eventually lead us to victory.”  
“Not Glimmer?”  
“Perhaps she could - but she is not a legendary warrior, prophesied to deliver the planet from evil.”  
“Good counterpoint.”  
“Adora,” Angella said, bending down to speak with her face to face. “I apologise for prying into your private affairs, but I must admit I forced my daughter to confess what I already suspected. That you have feelings for the Horde commander.”  
Adora felt her heart run cold. “What?”  
“Don’t take it out on her - I forced the issue. And I needed to know because of what we’ve discussed tonight. Optics. Do what you must, Adora, but remember. You are more than a soldier in this fight - you are a symbol of hope. There are many members of the Rebellion whose faith in the cause will be shaken to know you still have any ties at all to the Horde. And there is little we can do about that now. Am I clear?”  
Adora didn’t cry. “Of course.”  
“I know you want to see her again.” Angella’s eyes glazed a little. “You and I have a lot in common, despite the gulf between us in age. We both have a broken heart. But while I can never see my husband again, you feel drawn back to her because there’s still a chance for something to fall into place… I won’t presume to give you advice on love. I tried it once and it nearly destroyed me. All I need is for you to promise me you’ll do what’s best for the Rebellion, without letting your personal feelings get in the way.”  
Adora had heard this sentiment before. It tasted of iron and neon.  
“I understand, Your Majesty,” she lied.  
“Good. Now go. And come back in time for the Gala. If you’re not back sunset tomorrow, I’m sending someone after you.”  
Adora bowed, and then ran downstairs, boots barely brushing the steps.

“Adora!” Swift Wind called in his brass tenor when he caught sight of her. “We ready to go?”  
“We are,” she said, throwing herself onto the beast’s broad, muscular back. “Fly!”  
His wings beat once and her stomach lurched. They fell upward into the sky like a cloud of doves.  
As she held fast to Swift Winds mane, she thought about what Angella had said, and rain started to lash at her skin.  
Why was she drawn back over and over? All her memories of Catra were terribly, impossibly muddled. Their rivalry was a barbed brick wall. Their ties to Shadow Weaver, and the trauma she’d inflicted on both - which Adora was only barely starting to understand - was a black hedge maze. The relationship Adora had with Catra was knotted, tangled, stretched thin - but not broken. Perhaps that alone was why Adora continued to follow the string out into the wood; if only they could move the mountains they’d both hidden behind, they might find something else, something Adora thought might last forever.  
If this creature in the wood had something to do with Shadow Weaver, Catra would be there. Adora knew she would be there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8o5BHH9U2Mg


	2. Fright Zone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catra is given a new assignment, and her failure to deal with her feelings reaches it's apex.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1PpwvbWClY 

Under a tarnished copper sky the Fright Zone boiled, constantly in motion; a sea of steel hydraulics and gas flares. The toothy skyline of the nightmarish landscape rolled and rumbled - the thunder of military-industry threaded through by the constant rising and falling of sirens.  
A gout of burning exhaust roared up, igniting a patch of smog, and light filtered through the dead blades of an empty air conditioning unit, perched on the roof of a long repurposed First-One’s structure.  
Two eyes glared in the dark. One yellow, one blue. A lithe silhouette unrolled, and slipped out onto the rooftops, tail flickering in the shadows.  
She made her way to the edge of the roof and stretched easily into the wind, stepping onto a cable strung between highrises. Horde soldiers patrolled far below.  
Her game was to avoid them. Everywhere she went, always, she went unseen. She made a point of it - it had done her reputation wonders. Few people spoke ill of someone that might be around any given corner.  
The figure clung to the bones of the city, slipping down walls and around checkpoints. She saw parts of the city no one else ever did. Walled off streets, now overgrown with harsh-smelling thorns and black flowers. Structures condemned and allowed to atrophy, revealing the First-One’s foundations the whole Fright Zone was built upon.  
She saw everything from her world above it all.  
A Horde patrol passed beneath her as she sprang a full ten feet from one roof to another. She kept running and leapt again and again, the gaps between each rooftop growing larger, each gulf she crossed widening in succession.  
To make the last jump, she reached out with her missing hand and failed to grab the ledge that would save her, falling hard into a web of pipes, and bouncing like a pinball down into an alley. Light debris sprinkled her as she lay on her back on the concrete.  
Catra gazed to her right - to the space her arm should be. The space she could still feel it sometimes.  
She rolled to her feet, and walked the rest of the way to Entrapta’s lab. 

Catra came in the top window, falling lightly to her feet behind her most trusted minions. Entrapta was too absorbed to notice her - the turncoat princess sat atop her long, animated hair, welding something; Catra didn’t care what.  
Scorpia on the other hand, was only pretending to listen to whatever Entrapta was telling her, and noticed Catra’s arrival immediately.  
“Catra!” she shouted.  
“I think you may be confused again, friend Scorpia,” said Entrapta through her mask. “We’re discussing causality and paradoxes, not Catra - though I suppose I can see why you’d mix the two up…”  
“You’re back!” Scorpia made to pull Catra into a spiny embrace, but stopped when she saw the bruise on Catra’s cheek. “What happened?”  
“Nothing!” Catra hissed. “Quit touching it - it’s not making it feel any better!”  
Entrapta looked over her shoulder. “Oh heeey- Catra is here! You’re just in time to learn about general relativity!”  
“Have you fixed my arm yet?” Catra tapped her foot.  
“Huh? Oh, yeah. Over there, somewhere.”  
Entrapta waved a ponytail at the corner of the room. Catra started digging through a table of the week’s cast-aside projects until she found a silver-clawed gauntlet.  
Scorpia watched Catra pull the prosthetic free, and start attaching it. She winced at the chill bite of steel against her shoulder.  
“You need a hand?”  
Catra glared daggers.  
“What?” Scorpia said. “Oh! Oh boy, I’m sorry. That was kinda - a poor way to put it.”  
“Mm-hmm.” Catra tossed a strap over her shoulder and pulled it tight. “Thanks for the offer. But I don’t need help. Anything important happen while I was away?”  
“Not really - Hordak wants you to report in the second your arm’s fixed. Which is now, I guess.”  
“I fixed it a week ago!” Entrapta called shrilly. “And I’m starting to get the feeling neither of you have been following my lecture on spacetime.”  
“Entrapta, honey.” Catra ran her sharp, mechanical fingers through the princess’ hair. “You know I never listen to you.”  
Entrapta looked down and nodded. “That is true. You did say that. Okay- I guess I’ll just go back to building this super cool thing by myself again!”  
“Uh-huh,” said Catra. “Tell me all about it when it’s done-”  
Catra stopped.  
“What is it?” Scorpia asked.  
Catra narrowed her eyes at a fat blackbird sitting on a power line. “What do you want,” she asked it.  
The bird fell toward them, warping and melting. It’s wings shed their feathers and became bat-like, it’s beak twisted into a pair of sharp teeth, and it’s talons peeled into fingers.  
Hordak’s messenger, Imp, flapped to Scorpia’s shoulder and perched like a gargoyle. It opened its mouth, and Hordak’s stern baritone emanated out.  
_Catra… I am most displeased by your most recent failure. Report to the throne room at once. That is all._  
Imp closed their mouth, and flew back out the window, shapeshifting into a bat.  
Scorpia opened her mouth to talk, but closed it glumly before anything came out.  
“I’d better go see what the fuss is about,” Catra said. 

Hordak’s throne room lay at the heart of his palace - a First-One’s temple, plated with black iron, and irrigated with pipes. Hordak himself wasn’t in his tall, green throne. He stood with his back to Catra when she entered.  
“Welcome back,” he said.  
“Thanks.” Catra stood on the balls of her feet. She couldn’t run if she wanted to, but the habit held fast.  
“I am sending you out on assignment. Tonight.”  
Whatever Catra had been expecting, it wasn’t this. “Already? I thought-”  
“Don’t question me, Force Commander.”  
Catra top lip caught on a fang as she sneered. “Of course not, Lord Hordak.”  
He turned. His red, sharp-edged eyes peered down at her, standing alone in his empty court. Imp whispered something in his ear.  
“Your record is a study in contrasts, Force Commander Catra. But your last assignment has forced me to reevaluate things. I have planned your next mission myself.”  
Catra’s fur stood on end at his tone. “What do you need me to do?”  
“Hmm,” he said, slowly descending the steps up to his throne, coming to stand over her. “I’ll be the first to admit I’ve never taken much interest in you personally, or any of your cohort. Shadow Weaver was ultimately a liability, but she was good at keeping tabs on children. Adora… she was interesting.” Hordak fixed Catra with a cruel glare. “And you love her.”  
The claws on Catra’s feet dug into the steel beneath her. Every thread in her body was pulled a different direction. “I _hate_ her! Who told you that? I’ll kill them-” the words spilled out unconsciously. The Horde Overlord watched impassively.  
“Save it,” he said. “I’m not stupid - even if _you_ are. You cannot be trusted to go into battle against She-Ra any longer. You are... ineffective.”  
Catra felt like she was unraveling. Adora was ruining her life again and she didn’t even need to be here to do it.  
“So,” Hordak went on. “I propose to use you in a different manner.”  
Catra looked up, suspiciously. “What do you mean?”  
“You may have heard rumours of a Horde attack on several settlements in the Whispering Wood.”  
“What about ‘em?”  
“They are being perpetrated by a creature Shadow Weaver created long ago. I found it in her laboratory. And I freed it.”  
“...And you want me to go and take command?”  
“No. I want you to help She-Ra destroy it.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjJy9GL66Ek 

Catra listened to the rest of Hordak’s plan in silence. She didn’t understand why he was suggesting what he was suggesting, and she didn’t understand why - somehow - these new orders made her feel so sick.  
She did not think about Adora.  
Catra took to the rooftops again, and made for a tower near the edge of the city that she’d climbed hundreds of times. A clap of red lightning lit the air and a deluge of rain made her ascent slick and terrifying - though it was an easier climb alone.  
She did not think about Adora.  
When she reached the pinnacle, her heart felt like it would burst. The storm screamed at her, and she screamed back. She screamed up into the sky until her voice was raw, and a shard of whatever it was she’d buried deep inside slipped out into her bloodstream and caught in her throat.  
Catra thought of Adora’s smile when she was winning, and the way she frowned when she was outsmarted.  
Catra thought of the sharp lance of pain she’d felt when Adora had stopped speaking to her at all when they fought.  
Catra noticed the crushing, endless weight hanging inside her. She thought of Adora’s pretty hair, her stupid perfect teeth, and the way she’d replaced Catra like she was nothing at all.  
When the wrecked sobbing ended, Catra was cold in the rain.  
She knotted into a ball and bathed in something new - some feeling that had been unearthed by the storm. Something that seemed to ignore the fear it was surrounded by.  
Catra didn’t know what it was, and was too tired to figure it out.  
All she knew was that she was going to see Adora again, and as far as Catra could tell, their repeating meetings were the only reason she existed.


	3. The Seeker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adora and Catra head toward their fateful meeting. Old memories surface, and a new enemy sports an old face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi y'all sorry for the slow updates! The new year happened. I don't intend on giving up on this series yet but if you want to yell at me online to write faster (which i'd appreciate) you can follow me on twitter @dyna_tillo. let me know if the formatting makes more sense now also

Under the fluttering shadow of a long, snapping banner, the window of Catra’s quarters glowered out over the Fright Zone. Since her promotion, she’d been given a space of her own - though it was bare of any decoration. 

Catra sat on her windowsill, with a leg and tail dangling below.

“Catra?” Scorpia craned her neck through the door. “What did the boss want? You’re not gonna be launched into the sun are you?”

“I’m leaving again.”

“Again?”

“Seems like Hordak can’t wait to get rid of me every time I make it back.”

“That doesn’t seem like him. Well, actually yeah it does. Maybe he thinks you’re gonna lead a coup? Hey, are you? That could be fun!”

“I like the way you think, Scorpia.” Catra leapt to her feet. “But nah- not now, anyway. If I do, you’re my first pick for Force Commander.”

Scorpia’s barbed claws gently picked Catra up to swing her around. “You got it, Overlord Catra!”

Catra’s teeth went on edge, and she froze, still deeply uncomfortable about being touched. They stood together - Catra winced and counted every second, but didn’t pull away. 

“Hey!” Scorpia said. “Two and a half seconds! That’s not bad!”

Catra’s skin prickled beneath her fur. “Your shell doesn’t make it any easier.”

“I’m just happy you’re giving hugs a shot! Nothing better than a good hug.” Scorpia sighed and snapped her claws open and shut. “Next I’m gonna teach you how to enjoy ballet!”

“Don’t hold your breath.”

Scorpia laughed. “I’ll let Entrapta know you’re going.”

“Not like she’ll notice either way.”

“She can be a little… obsessive.”

“Hey - as long as she’s keeping me in good standing with the Horde she can act however the hell she wants.”

“I guess. I wonder if it’s good for her?”

“You think she’s gonna explode?”

“Maybe not her - but something is.”

Catra hefted a bag to her shoulder. “Well, we can pry her away from that thing of hers when I get back.”

“If you say so.”

“See you later, Scorpia.”

Scorpia watched her friend leap to the sill once more, tumble out, and skim down the side of the palace, into the glowing streets of the Fright Zone below. Scorpia had never really expected to wind up with friends after her family was cast out by the other princesses. It turned out being friends with someone was a lot of work. 

But it was work she did happily. She was really the only one strong enough to do it, out of the three of them, and it seemed silly to let them slip away.

* * *

As Catra coursed through the Fright Zone like a current, a memory snapped at her heels.

_The covers of the bed tilted, rolled. Fell still. A pair of legs burrowed beneath her. Heavy breathing in the dark._

_Catra opened one eye a sliver and waited for Adora to fall asleep, but she didn’t. Catra listened to her struggle - wondered whether or not she should do something._

_“Are you awake?” Adora whispered._

_“Yeah. Are you okay?”_

_“Yeah. Kinda.”_

_“What did she say?”_

_“She said I shouldn’t talk to you anymore if I know what’s good for me.”_

_“You obviously don’t know what’s good for you,” Catra said, and crawled up to Adora's side. They lay face to face - shoulders crushed and bent awkwardly. Catra was surprised to see a tear in Adora’s eyes. “Hey- come on! It’s not that big a deal. Who cares what she says! What does she know?” Adora wiped her eye. “You know better than to let her get to you, right?_

_“She cares about us - she was just worried that we weren’t coming back.”_

_“She cares about you Adora. And even that’s a stretch. She doesn’t want us to see each other. That doesn’t seem right to you, does it?”_

_https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ES0PSdBUpSU_

_It didn’t. Adora had to admit, that despite her foster-mother’s disapproval - and the unchecked damage it was doing - she didn’t think she’d ever be able to listen to someone who wanted her to stay away from Catra._

_Adora felt as though they were both made of electricity - that they daren't touch, for fear of death. Catra’s palm lay face up by Adora’s own - she could idly trace a circle on it, if she wanted._

_"What did you see out there?" Catra said, and Adora’s eyes refocused._

_"I don't know. Nothing. I did hit my head pretty hard."_

_Catra smiled crookedly. "Sorry about that. I admit… I need to chill sometimes."_

_Adora laughed. "You think?"_

_"But that's why I have you. You balance me out a little."_

_Adora sighed. "We do balance each other pretty well, huh."_

_Catra's fur prickled as Adora shuffled closer absentmindedly._

_“Hey,” Catra said slowly. “Do you remember when we were kids?”_

_“Not all of it,” Adora said, and then she remembered exactly what Catra meant. “You mean the time I convinced you that there was a Horde initiation? And it involved a bunch of really terrible kissing?”_

_“Yeah,” Catra said, even though Adora had misremembered - it was the other way around. Trying to learn how to kiss was Catra’s idea._

_“Hey, Adora,” Catra said, they touched hands, just barely - just their smallest fingers. They were made of electricity. Adora felt her heart come alive._

_A pillar of light fell over them, as the door to the dormitories snapped open, and they played dead. A long shadow floated up to look at them, lying side by side, still as the grave._

_Shadow Weaver lowered her mask to peer at Catra, and then left._

_When she was gone, Catra curled up at Adora’s feet._

* * *

As the memory faded, Adora squinted into the rain, her one good eye struggling to pierce the haze. When she spotted a clearing, she took the chance. “Swift Wind!” she called. “Take us down!”

He followed her lead. “Wind is getting pretty choppy,” he said as they landed in the clearing, and hurried under the shelter of the trees. “Nothing I couldn’t handle, of course. But can’t have been great for you up there. Hey, you need an umbrella?” He propped a wing up over her, as they began their howling trek through the woods. 

Adora pulled her cloak about her - the woods groaned with the weight of ice. She steeled herself, pressed on through the snow. Swift Wind folded his wings and struggled along behind her, muttering at the twigs and icicles sticking in his plumage. 

The storm abated, but a chill, slow drifting snow took its place. 

“Say… Adora,” said Swift Wind, as the winds started to die off enough to speak.

“Hm?”

“I’m all for sudden reckless solo missions…”

“But?”

“I need to ask, why? You’re smart. I’ve seen you make some- difficult choices in the heat of battle. You know tactics, and uh, strategies…”

“I have been known to use some tactics and strategies.”

“Going alone in the middle of the night to fight a monster that just popped up doesn’t seem very tactful, Adora.”

She glanced over her shoulder, and smirked at him. “I know you don’t care for planning, Swifty. And I know what this question is really about.”

“What’re you talking about?”

Adora crouched by a bank of snow. “Coming alone wasn’t tactful, but it was the right thing to do. Whatever’s out here has some sort of tie with Shadow Weaver - that means Catra’s behind it. She’ll be here. She’s my responsibility, and I don’t want my friends getting hurt by her. Last time we met, she nearly-”

“-killed Bow, I was there.”

“And I want to be here alone because I want Catra to talk to me. I’m done fighting her.”

“What if she doesn’t want to talk?”

Adora looked down at the sword in her hands. It’s jewel glinted in the darkness. “I’ll have to do what’s right. I’ll stop her… for good. LIke I said, I’m done fighting her.”

“That’s not gonna be easy.”

“No. It’s not. I really hope things don’t come to that, but you can always count on me to do what’s right, Swifty.”

“I know,” the horse said. “But what if what’s right is the hardest possible path?”

Adora dropped the Sword of Protection back into place on her back. “That’s when it helps to be able to turn into an 8 foot warrior princess.”

Swift Wind nickered. “Just checking in on your morals. You know how I do. Good to know you still want to do the right thing.”

“Always.”

“Speaking of which, given any thought to what I said about Light Hope?”

Adora hesitated. “Not enough, yet.” She might have said something more, but their march had led them to the village they were looking for - Brookdale. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzFnYcIqj6I

“Oh, no…” Adora found the town frozen shut and empty. Each home looked like a snow capped skull. She saw no bodies or blood marking the ice, and held hope that the people who had lived in the town had escaped into the wood - though where they might be heading for, she had no idea.

“Hello?” Adora called. Swift Wind followed cautiously behind her as she made her way through Brookdale. They passed a stone fountain in the town square, locked under a thin sheet of frost - an inverted crystal chandelier.

Her heart sank lower with each passing moment, and each empty house. It didn’t look like anyone had left in a hurry; it didn’t look like anyone had left at all. They had just been there one moment, and been gone the next. Idly, Adora picked up a glass of water, frozen solid on a window sill. 

A dark flash dashed across her peripheral, and she drew the sword in a breath, pointing it back down the street she’d walked up. 

Adora and her horse retraced their steps back to the town square, to the shimmering fountain, and then she caught the flash again, tracked it with her gaze to a rooftop, and took a short breath, like a cold tongue of lightning had fired down into her lungs. 

 

Catra looked down at Adora and their gazes locked, each with a stare drawn tight as razor wire, singing in the building breeze. Catra’s body flushed hot and cold with swirling nerves, and a handful of raindrops fell upon her face, followed soon after by a slowly thickening pane of sleet and hail. The impossible, shifting weather dumped sleet into the snow, turning it into an shallow arctic sea around Adora’s ankles. 

Catra’s arm stung in the cold. She had a million things to say but could only focus on the sharp phantom ache. Her metal claw twitched.

“Hey Adora.”

She said it simply, but the words were loaded. Catra smirked, seeing Adora’s right eye harden from afar.

“Catra!” Adora called, and Catra watched her put the blade away. “I’m here alone! To talk. Are you gonna talk? Or do we have to do this the hard way again?”

Catra tilted her head at the horse. “Alone? You brought that dunce with you. And no - I don’t want to talk. Are you too scared to fight me? I don’t blame you… the last time didn’t pan out so well, huh?” Catra felt a sick rush as she lashed out, the barbs in her words catching, drawing blood. Part of Catra knew it was hurting them both, but Catra was too addicted to the struggle to care. “You are scared, aren’t you?” the Horde commander went on. “That’s the real reason you’re here alone. You know that ever since I got this-” she flexed her the steel points on her fingertips “-I’m too dangerous to risk your friends around. I guess I’ll just have to turn your horse into glue instead.”

Swift Wind balked. “That’s where glue comes from?”

Adora said something under the blanket of rain, and Catra called out. “What was that, poster-girl?”

Adora rubbed her eyepatch sadly, and a flickering jewel of a tear welled in her good eye. 

“I am scared,” she admitted. 

Catra remembered the night in the bed again and faltered. “What?”

“I’m scared this is the last time we’ll speak. And I’m scared that this is how things end between us. Don’t you see? We can’t keep going on like this, Catra. It’s killing us.”

“Killing _you._ Thanks to Hordak, I’m stronger than ever.”

Adora drew the sword. “Catra…” she said. 

“Oh you wanna fight now?”

“Catra…”

“Honestly, Adora, I hope this is the last time we meet - you’re too easy to predict, too easy to bait out into the open alone. And I’m bored of you.”

“Catra- behind you!”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBwS66EBUcY

Catra turned, and a wall of shadows rose behind her - from it sprang a coil of darkness which swept her up, and tossed her across the square. 

Adora moved to draw her sword and transform, but her hands made an executive decision and caught the falling Horde commander instead, dropping the blade back into its scabbard.

Catra lay in Adora’s arms, stunned for a spell. “Put me down!” she demanded, and struggled free into the icy water. 

“What in Etheria is that thing?” Adora asked. 

Through the rain they could just make out the shadow moving, slipping down into the streets and rushing toward them. Catra scrambled to her feet. “Hordak called it the Seeker-” she managed, before the shadow was upon them. It’s amorphous outline hardened at the edges, and started to peel away. From it stepped an outline of Shadow Weaver, cast in grayscale. 

Adora grit her teeth. “It _is_ her.”

“It’s not!” Catra’s voice called from somewhere in the rain. “It’s-”

“Stay away from them!” Swift Wind dive bombed into Adora’s view and tried to put a hoof into the back of Shadow Weaver’s head, but he sailed straight through like there was nothing there. Adora watched, horrified, as the thing became solid, and caught his tail in an iron grip, twirling the heavy winged beast, and hurling him into the frozen fountain. 

It shattered into powder, and he seemed out cold, splayed across it.

“Swifty!” Adora already had the Sword of Protection back out, and she raised it above her head. “For the honour of Grayskull!”


	4. Together and Apart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The shadow proves dangerous. Adora and Catra find the tension between them too much to bear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the slow updates. I gotta be sneaky about writing this at work! :D
> 
> This week we're REALLY earning that explicit rating, by the way. Just in case you forgot this was smut.

The shadow leapt toward Adora. She stood her ground with the Sword of Protection held high, her battle cry ringing through the wind and rain, and just as the ghostly reflection of Shadow Weaver was upon her - it’s arms sharpened to points - a bolt of lightning fell from the heavens and crashed into the blade. 

The transformation into She-Ra was as exhilarating as the first time, even so many years later. Fluorescent sunlight flashed over her. When she opened her eye, she momentarily had the sensation of hurtling through space, streaking across the galaxy with poles of lambent color bending around her. 

Adora felt as though her brain was lighting up from within, and it’s energy surged to her hands and feet and back again. Her bones shook as they changed. Her stomach turned. It always seemed like there was a chance the power would simply burn her up like a firework, and when She-Ra emerged, Adora would be gone forever. Part of her relished it. Other parts were unsure.

The glittering corona around her peeled away, and She-Ra’s glossy sea of hair unfolded, falling in waves down her back as the light subsided. Her eyepatch - now white - still sat over Adora’s five thin scars. 

The shadow halted, confused, and She-Ra pointed the tip of her blade at the thing. 

“This is your only chance to surrender, creature.”

The inky apparition of Shadow Weaver hissed from an unseen mouth, before it dove towards her again, piercing the air with it’s lance-tipped arms. She-Ra parried and staggered - the duel quickly became more taxing than she had expected. 

The thing was too fast, and when she thought she had it, it became insubstantial, floating around her counterattacks like smoke. The ghostly creature fenced with uncanny tact, corralling her into a wall. As it fought, it spoke, in a voice like tattered black ribbon:

_“Illusions come, illusions go, show a true face to our foe...”_

The creature’s false mask split in two, unveiling a row a glittering fangs. Before she could rally, it grew three long tentacles, gripped her neck, and pressed her against the stone wall. It lifted a pointed arm, and aimed it at her ribcage.

Adora saw her options laid bare - she had none that were fast enough. Her best bet was to take a wound, and then surprise the thing.

“Adora!”

The snowy air parted and Catra leapt from it, landing between them as the creature struck. The sharpened point caught Catra’s shoulder, pushing her into She-Ra’s arms, and the very end of the shadow’s lance pricked She-Ra’s chest, as it barely broke the surface of Catra’s back.

Catra’s steel claw snapped up and grabbed the lance, holding the creature in place. “Now!” she called, and before the shadow could slip away, She-Ra levelled the sword at it’s head. The blade crackled, and a stroke of white lightening lashed down it’s length and into the enemy. The creature screamed, half of it boiling into ashes on the wind. The lance that pinned Catra became nothing, and Catra fell forward onto her hands. She-Ra caught a glimpse of the unnerving spray of blood in the snow.

Catra looked up. “Is it dead?”

“Not quite.” The shadow twisted like a tornado, patching itself back together. She-Ra thought for a moment she saw a figure within the veil - not Shadow Weaver - but something else. It seemed to re-evaluate them, and then it melted into the air, and was gone.

She-Ra’s transformation ended, and Adora dropped to her knees at Catra’s side. “That was stupid of you,” she said. 

Catra grit her teeth and tried to wrestle free. “Leave me. Get outta here.”

“Not without you. You’re hurt. Bad.”

“Just leave me!” Catra clutched her shoulder. “You’d be better off without me around anyway.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. Stubbornly, silently, and carefully, Adora hefted Catra up into her arms, and looked around for Swift Wind. He was gone. She prayed he’d gone for help. 

Without him, and with the storm continuing to build, Adora needed shelter. She carried Catra - slipping in and out of unconsciousness - to one of the empty houses. There, Adora set herself to work shoring up the broken windows and doors, shaking snow out of abandoned bedsheets, and trying to recall what she could about treating wounds. Adora’s search for medical supplies was fruitless, giving her further hope that the townsfolk had ran, but forcing her to make do with what she had. 

Adora tore her shirt to shreds and went to bind Catra’s shoulder. The buckles for her prosthetic arm were in the way. Adora undid them and the steel arm fell away, lifeless. Adora stared at Catra’s empty shoulder and ran her hand up the scar tissue - wide and flat, like the blade that had made the cut. A heavy pang of deep regret tingled Adora’s palms. What could she have done differently?

The night was long, and Adora did not sleep. She was fearful of the shadow creature returning, but it did not. She also feared closing her eye, and opening it to find Catra gone. She needed Catra - Catra knew something about the shadow. Adora couldn’t let her escape again.

When morning came, the storm had passed. Adora opened the door and found blinding white blankets of snow covering the town. She blinked up into the blue sky, and slowly, a figure wheeled down, growing larger and larger until it’s wingspan was several yards wide.

“Swift Wind!” she cried, as he landed on the fluffy white ground. 

“I got help!” he said, and Glimmer and Bow dropped from his sides, landing up to their knees in the snowfall. 

“Adora!” Glimmer vanished in a shimmer of pink, and appeared with her arms around Adora, while Bow struggled in the powder.

“Aw, come on!” he said. “Glimmer, I thought we talked about this! No teleporting to get to the group hug first!” 

Adora charged through the snow to meet him halfway, Glimmer clinging to her side. They tumbled in a ball of laughter and limbs.

“What happened?” Glimmer said, looking at the blood on Adora’s chest, and her torn shirt. 

Adora shook her head. “It’s not mine. I guess I have a lot of explaining to do.”

Bow nodded gravely. “Uh-huh, how about starting with explaining that?” he said, pointing over to the house. Catra stood shakily in the door, glaring at the three of them in the snow. She took a step toward them.

“Catra, wait!” Adora called. “You shouldn’t be walking-”

“Adora, why is she here?” Glimmer asked.

Catra took another step, faltered, and tripped. Adora went to her - Bow and Glimmer close behind - and rolled her over, onto her back. Fresh blood lit the ground.

“She’s hurt,” Bow said. “Bad. She… doesn’t look like she’s gonna make it.”

Catra tried to speak, squinting in the bright daylight. “Adora…” she whispered. 

“I’m here.”

“Am I dead?”

“Not yet. We’re gonna help you.”

Glimmer glanced at Bow. “We are?”

Adora clenched Catra’s hand. “She’s passed out again…” she looked up at her closest friends. “We have to get her to Castle Brightmoon.”

“We do?” Bow said. “Uh- are you sure Glimmer’s mom is gonna be cool with that?”

Adora picked Catra up, and started carrying her to Swift Wind. “Catra knows something about what happened here. And - I’m willing to bet - a lot of Hordak’s plans. She’s…” Adora looked down at Catra, defenceless and dying. “...a valuable prisoner,” she made herself say. 

Bow sighed. “I guess that _is_ true.”

Glimmer helped lift Catra on to the alicorn’s back telekinetically. “We should get moving then - she doesn’t have much time.”

“Hold on,” Swift Wind said. “Four people? Adora.”

“Just this once, Swifty.”

“You owe me.”

“I’ll get you the good oats.”

“Done.”

***

“And you’re telling me she’s in the infirmary now?” Queen Angella said from her throne. 

Adora knelt before her. “Yes, your Majesty. I figured once she’s recovered a little, we can… interrogate her. She knows more about the shadow creature I faced in Brookdale.”

“Please.” Angella stood, and floated down from the throne to Adora’s side. She made a sharp gesture, signalling for Adora to stand at ease, and then put a soft hand on her shoulder. “You couldn’t interrogate that young woman if you wanted to. You wish to turn her.”

“I mean,” Adora gulped. “Isn’t that a good thing? Shouldn’t we try? Having her on our side could completely turn the tide of the war! We could have a way to win.”

“Were it so simple. Yes, I suppose it is worth a try. But I doubt it will be as easy as you think, even if love is involved. Frankly, your feelings for her - and hers for you, if they exist - will likely only make matters much more difficult.” Angella shook her head. “But to decide to make such a move now. Right before the Gala. You remember what I told you, don’t you? What do you think the supporters of our war effort will think about Force Commander Catra being here?”

“Well, first of all, I didn’t decide to do this, it just happened-” Angella scoffed, “-and second, I’m not convinced our supporters wouldn’t agree with me. She’s a valuable asset, one way or another.”

“I do wish you didn’t love arguing so much.” Angella smiled. “You feel strongly about it. I have faith in you, Adora. After all, you _are_ She-Ra, and I have been wrong to doubt you in the past. Perhaps this is part of how you save us all.”

***

The Gala drew closer, and Catra’s health improved. Angella placed a guard on her room, confiscated her arm, and barred anyone from visiting her, save Adora, who visited her every day. 

A week out from the Gala, Adora was surprised to find Catra sitting up, awake. 

She was looked out the window by her bed, dressed in a white infirmary gown that was a size too big. Adora stood silently at the door for a spell.

“I’m sorry,” Adora said eventually. Catra kept gazing out at the mountains and plains surrounding the castle. At the edge of the wood there were a group of children playing. Catra seemed as if she hadn’t heard Adora speak at all.

Adora nodded, stung. She started to leave. 

“Don’t go.”

Adora looked back and Catra’s eyes were locked on hers. “Stay,” Catra said. 

Adora sat awkwardly next to Catra’s bed. Catra lay back on her pillows and sighed. “Sorry for what.”

“Everything,” Adora said. “Your arm. For leaving. For everything with Shadow Weaver.” Catra was still again. “Do you… accept my apology?”

“No.”  
Adora shook her head. “Why not? I understand that I hurt you. Listen to me, Catra. I get it.”

“You don’t. You can’t just say sorry, Adora. It’s too late for that.”

The blood in Adora’s face started simmering. “What more do you want from me?”

“Everything.” Catra turned her head to look at her. “You have to be willing to give up everything.” Adora grit her teeth in silence, and Catra went back to looking out the window. “This place sucks.”

Adora’s anger reached its apex, and toppled under its own weight. She chuckled. “You haven’t changed much.”

“Neither did you,” Catra said, facing away. “And that’s what pisses me off about you Adora. You act like you’re always reinventing yourself, always getting better. Changing. But you don’t really. You act the same as you did when you were part of the Horde, just in the opposite direction. You still act like you’re better than everyone. I guess it’s probably hard not to, when you basically are better than everyone. But it made being your friend too hard.”

Adora sat still and listened. 

“You do this thing,” Catra went on, “where you identify your problems and act like you fixed them just because you know they’re there. You don’t put any effort into actually trying to change, you just come in here and say sorry for all the shit you put me through without meaning it. I don’t care about it all anymore, Adora.” Catra put her chin on the windowsill. “You replaced me. You maimed me. I know you’re sorry, but I don’t care. I just want you to stop doing it.”

The bed shifted under Adora’s weight as she climbed up beside Catra. “I can be selfish,” she said. “But I do want to get better.” They looked out the window together. 

“Why am I here?” Catra asked.

“I want you to join us.”

Catra snorted. “Not gonna happen.”

“I think it will.”

“Why?”

“We can’t be kept apart. I know you feel the same way.” 

Catra’s fur prickled. “What do you mean?”

“I mean… we keep running into each other. Again and again.”

“Fighting opposite sides of a war will do that, Adora.”

“I think it’s more than that. The last few years… I’ve come to think there’s more to it than that.”

Catra turned to face her. “What are you saying, you in love with me or some-” Adora’s face was closer to hers than she expected. Catra could smell something on her. Perfume? Like madonna lilies. Adora’s cloudy grey eyes dilated. Her smooth shoulders were bare, one strap of her tank top was threatening to fall. Before Adora could answer, Catra stammered, “you still betrayed us. If I wasn’t half dead I’d tear your throat out right now.”

Adora smirked. “I’d like to see you try,” she said, borderline teasing.

_Oh no,_ Catra thought. _She’s hot._

Catra swallowed. “Look. I - this is weird. It means a lot for you to apologize, I guess. And I mean what I said before, but this is a waste of your time. You can’t turn me away from the Horde.”

“Honestly? I’m not trying to,” Adora said. “I told the Queen I’d try win you over, help you understand that the Horde is evil, but right now I don’t care. All I’ve wanted for the past few years is to see you again. Like this.”

“Injured?”

“No. Not fighting.”

“Why?” 

“I just- I need you, Catra. I like it here. And I… like you. So I want you here with me. That’s it. I’m not thinking about politics as much as I am about myself. So I guess… you’re right. I am still selfish. Right now I’m just happy I have you again.” 

The strap on Adora’s shoulder slipped down as she adjusted her weight on the bed. Catra eyed it. “All I wanted the past few years was an apology from you…” she said, absentmindedly.

“Well,” Adora leaned forward a little. “It might not have been perfect, but you got it. What do you want next?”

Catra knew exactly what she wanted next. “I don’t know,” she whispered, and she put her hand down on the bed. It brushed Adora’s. Neither one of them pulled away. Adora put her hand firmly on top of Catra’s. Catra closed her eyes, parted her lips.

“Commander Adora!” The guard outside called into the room. “Sorry to interrupt, but you’re needed.”

Catra opened her eyes, breathing heavily. Adora squeezed her hand, got up, and put on her coat to leave. “We should... talk more. I should go. I’m sorry,” she said, and she meant it.

Catra watched her go, stunned by the adrenaline pumping through her body. When her heart started to slow, she grimaced, pulled a pillow from the pile behind her, and threw it across the room in a shower of feathers.

Adora, as she left, could not stop her hands from shaking.

***

That night, when the castle fell dark, the Gala preparations had ceased, and the night guards had been posted, Adora and Catra both lay awake, burning.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-B5yr2zyY0 

Adora ran a hand down her silken white nightgown, touching the places Catra had brushed by accident, trying to remember the exact look in her eyes. Adora still hadn’t slept, and a volatile cocktail of frustration of sleep-deprived delirium was boiling inside her.

The night was hot and humid. Adora was deeply claustrophobic and uncomfortable, and - half-asleep - she kicked the covers from her circular bed. She sat up and looked around the dark room. Nothing but shades of grey and blue. Adora took a deep breath, and lifted her nightgown up to her chest. 

Gingerly, she slid a hand down her stomach, over the stubbled patch between her legs. She’d forgotten that she wanted to shave again. With a deep sigh, she touched herself, and found she was, in fact, as turned on as she thought she might have been. 

Sometimes it wasn’t so easy. But tonight, her encounter with Catra had left her full of complicated knots, and her middle finger sank deep. Adora closed her eyes, rolled onto her stomach, and clenched her legs.

“Catra…”

***

Catra was not faring any better. Lovesick and dizzy with pain medication, she couldn’t stop thinking about what Adora had said.  
_I’d like to see you try._

Catra tried to think about something that made sense with regard to how she was feeling. She tried to think about Adora’s smooth shoulders. Her pretty hair. Her smile. What she might look like naked. 

Instead, Catra thought about nothing but her smirk and the layers in it; the challenge, the confidence, the power. Catra recalled what it felt like to be held in Adora’s arms in Brookdale, and it was then that she doubted for the first time whether or not she was even capable of completing her mission for the Horde. 

But right now, she wasn’t part of the Horde. She wasn’t even Catra. She was Adora’s. She groaned audibly at the thought of… belonging. A feverish lust gripped her throat. 

Catra dug out one of her pillows and put it in the middle of the bed. Carefully - minding her wounded arm - she crawled out of the infirmary gown, and balanced on top of the pillow. Moonlight lit her body through the window, but she was too many floors up to be seen. She didn’t care. Briefly, she wondered if someone might get mad at her for ruining a second pillow, but she decided she didn’t care about that either. 

She opened the window a crack. Relishing the feeling of breeze in her exposed fur, Catra spread her thighs wide, and started to grind her hips back and forward. Through clenched teeth - too scared to make any noise - Catra pictured Adora beneath her. 

Panting in the night air, Catra fell forward into the bed, burying her face in the pillows suppress her yelps of shocked bliss. 

***

Adora pointed her feet and curled her toes. She wound a hand around her bedsheets and dragged at them. The insides of her thighs were glassy and wet. She gasped, over and over, eyelids fluttering, imagining what it would be like to stick her tongue between Catra’s fangs. 

***

Catra tipped herself backwards, putting her one hand behind her. Her mane of hair tickled the small of her back as she bounced up and down. The bed was loud. 

She put her hand underneath herself, and then, imagining she was sitting on Adora’s smirking face, and that her hand was not her own, she lifted it and squeezed her own throat. Her legs locked up, and she shivered uncontrollably. Adora’s voice rang in her ears.  
_I’m just happy I have you again_

In a cold sweat they fell exhausted, and slept, together and apart.


	5. Effort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Glimmer opens up to Catra. Catra opens up to Princess Alliance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, quick dramatic update. From now on i'm aiming at shorter weekly updates. Next week is the gala!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxwAPBxc0lU

Adora was kept away from Catra in the days leading up to the Gala. She had work to do and endless training, and the two circled one another, snapping at Adora’s heels in perpetuity. 

Catra watched idly from her prison window. Some days Adora trained on the grounds below her infirmary-cell, and Catra could sit by the sill and watch Adora’s muscles sharpening in the sun. Today was such a day. Catra’s tail swished back and forth like a metronome.

She glowered down at Adora as she handily completed a workout routine in the castle courtyard that seemed murderously difficult. The hot air smelled like cut dry grass, and Catra resolved to remember it. 

“So, you have feelings for her?” asked a voice from the door.

Catra turned and found Glimmer in her room. “I didn’t hear you come in,” Catra said.

“I didn’t use the door.” Glimmer pulled a chair across so she could sit at Catra’s bedside. “Answer the question,” she said, gently.

Catra turned up her nose. “I don’t have to talk to you.”

“You do if you want my help surviving the day.”

Catra waited a beat, then sighed: “what do you mean?”

“Well,” Glimmer said, “you have a hearing today. Mom’s kept Adora busy, so she doesn’t know yet. Otherwise she would have already come and told you.”

“A hearing?”

Glimmer cocked her head. “Yeah. You’re going to stand in a courtroom. And talk. And be judged.”

“Execution huh. Guess I should have expected it.”

“What?” Glimmer squinted. “No! Just because you’re going to a hearing doesn’t mean you’re… do you even have a justice system in the Fright Zone?”

Catra shook her head. “Justice?”

Glimmer wrung her hands. “You really have no idea how bad it is there, do you?”

“Of course I do!” Catra snarled. “What am I, stupid? The place is a mess. It’s still better than here.”

“Is it though? Why are you loyal to them?”

“The Horde… lets me be who I am.” _A cheater. A thief._

Glimmer held Catra’s hand. “Maybe it’s time to rethink who you are?”

Catra’s nails lanced across Glimmer’s palm as she jerked away. “Don’t touch me.”

Glimmer nodded, startled and confused. “Oh- I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make you uncomfortable. We- I just meant to…” she trailed off, nursing the shallow cut. 

“So if I’m not getting executed, what’s this hearing about?”

“My Mom wants to speak with you and see if you’re willing to work with us. If you are, you get set free. If not… I don’t know. Mom’s gunning to keep you in here though. That’s why she’s keeping Adora away from it all.”

“So, what’s the point?”

“I know my Mom. She’d like you to change her mind. I can help you with that. If you tell me that you love Adora.”

Catra looked back out the window. Adora was gone. “Seems like you already think I do.”

“I love her too,” Glimmer said plainly. Catra snapped her attention back to the princess, who had tears shimmering in the corners of her eyes. Catra was transfixed, heart suddenly racing. “Loved her, I mean." The princess went on. "We were together for awhile,” Glimmer admitted, and a tear fell into the shallow cut. Catra didn’t move. “We broke it off on good terms - we’re still close and I’m happy about that, but… we tried to make it work and we couldn’t… and it was because of you.” Glimmer looked up with an expression Catra hadn’t known existed until that moment. Glimmer, crying, smiled.

“Me…”

“She told me she couldn’t be with me because of her feelings for you.”

Catra’s emotions ran hot, a boiling river sweeping her out to an evaporating sea. She was disgusted by the obscene proximity of joy, jealousy, contentment, sadness, regret… they piled on top of each other like birds devouring her whole. “So,” Glimmer went on, “I don’t know why, but I had to tell you. We were together - Adora and I - but she loves you, and I still love her, but too much to keep her from you… where I know she’ll be happy. I know her better than anyone, Catra. She loves you, and she wants to tell you, but I don’t think she knows how. Don’t mess it up. Please… don’t just let this crazy chance at making it work slip away. Put the effort in. Show her you care too.” She composed herself and stood up. “Good,” she said, with a shaky sigh. “I don’t want to fight you anymore.” Catra was stunned, and Glimmer leaned down to touch her shoulder. “Maybe we could be friends too, someday soon,” and she vanished in a plume of light.

“Wait! What about the hearing? What do I say to keep myself alive!” Glimmer was gone, and Catra was alone again. 

* * *

The hearing was modestly attended. Queen Angella was there, of course, and with her at a wide white bench of stone sat a grand jury of her peers - a handful of leaders of the Brightmoon community, and several members of the princess alliance whom Catra recognised, mostly by face. 

There was the young frosty one, the bored fish one, and the wacky flower girl. Glimmer sat at the bench too, but Adora was nowhere to be seen. 

Catra stood uncomfortably before them. Since she didn’t have two hands to cuff together, they had handcuffed her to the podium she stood at, in the white and gold courtroom. 

“Catra,” Queen Angella said, her calm voice like a cool wind from the bench. “This is not a trial; we are not here to find you guilty of anything; you are already guilty. We are here to hear you speak.”

“I- I don’t know what you want me to say,” Catra tried.

“We want nothing. Speak your piece, or return to your cell. Do you believe you are capable of changing?”

Catra pulled on her cuff sadly. “Maybe,” she said hopefully. “Maybe I could change. And I have information you could use. Horde troop movements-”

Catra stopped mid-sentence as the short one, Frosta, started laughing at her. “Troop movements!” Frosta parroted, cackling. It seemed out of character for the stone-faced young girl.

Taken aback, Catra gestured at her. “Is this... allowed, your Honour?” 

None of the other princesses batted an eyelid as Frosta fixed Catra with a bitter glare. “We don’t need troop movements. Stop trying to frame your worth around what you can offer to others.” The other princesses murmured agreement.

Catra grimaced. Here she was, trying to sell out the Horde, and they didn’t seem to care! “Fine!” she said. “I’ll be nothing but annoying and a drain on your resources, but I promise not to kill you all in your sleep I guess.”

Mermista raised an eyebrow. “Hrm. Getting better,” she drawled. “Perfuma,” she said to the attentive young woman at her side. “Do you believe her? You’re, like, insightful. Right?” 

Perfuma nodded. “Her aura isn’t entirely bad. Hard to say. I don’t think she’s on quite the right life path.”

Catra made eye contact with Glimmer, who said nothing as the others deliberated.

The giant doors to the courtroom opened, and Adora stood in silhouette against the light behind her. The jury hushed. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTLQhPFx2nM

“You didn’t invite me!” Adora said, striding across the room to Catra’s side. 

“Adora…” Angella rose from her seat. “Be calm. I called this hearing without you so we might gain an objective view of our new potential ally. Surely you understand.”

“Angella,” Adora said, and the others gasped at Adora’s refusal to address the monarch by title. “I _am_ calm. You’ve pulled a young woman out of captivity and into a hearing with no-one and nothing to help her. This is anything _but_ objective. I will gladly give up my seat with you up there… let me stand here.”

Adora took Catra’s cuffed hand in hers.

“I believe Catra,” Adora said. “She just needs us to give her a chance. I know there’s good in her. I know her better than anyone.”

Angella sat. “Catra?” she said. “What say you?”

Catra looked up at Adora - who squeezed her hand - and Catra realized for the first time how much Adora was putting on the line for her. She looked back to Glimmer and remembered what she had said: _Put in the effort. Show her you care._

“I can change,” Catra told them. “I don’t like it here, but maybe I will. I don’t… I don’t understand a lot of the world outside the Horde, but I can try. And I can’t promise you I’ll be useful to you, because I don’t know who I am anymore… I thought the Horde let me be who I truly was, but what if that’s what they wanted? They made me think that I wasn’t good enough to be anywhere else. I sure as hell don’t feel good enough to be here right now. Take it or leave it, I guess.”

Catra caught Glimmer’s eye, and smiled through a tear.


	6. Sparks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Planning for the Gala begins

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, shorter but more regular. That said, it already looks like next weeks update will be big compared to this one. I really just want to get to the Gala! There's good stuff coming up in that one... See you in a week :3

The decision to trust Catra was unanimous. She waited for the verdict outside the courtroom, under guard, and when Adora came to deliver the consensus, all Catra could say was:

“...Do I get my arm back?”

“Uh,” Adora. “Not yet. You’re free to walk around, but I don’t think they trust you with that thing yet.”

“That thing?” Catra said, indignant, but following along behind Adora as she took off into the halls of Castle Brightmoon. “That thing is my arm, Adora. Maybe I’m not expressing exactly what it means to me.”

“Okay, fair. But it is like... unnecessarily pointy. Doesn’t it hurt to wear?”

Catra snorted. “Sure it does. Chafes pretty bad. You regret cutting it off?”

Adora let her hand drift along a window sill as they walked. Catra gazed up at her, standing with a sunlit halo. Adora turned her head to remind Catra of the eyepatch. “I think we’ve established we both have some regrets,” she said.

Catra swayed in the hallway. “What now? Where are we going?”

Adora smiled and pitched back into her stride. “I wanted to introduce you to some people!”

***

Bow was waiting in Glimmer’s room. All these years, and Glimmer had never had much opportunity to redecorate or move rooms. Her bed still dangled twenty feet off the ground, and Bow hung upside down from the side of it as she came in and started changing out of the formal wear she’d worn to the hearing.

“How’d it go?”

Glimmer hopped behind her changing screen. “Good. Catra ended making a statement, surprisingly. We’re keeping an eye on her for now.”

“You know that’s not what I meant. How did the other thing go?”

Glimmer returned even more dressed up than before - a pearl-coloured, backless satin dress. Her tiny pink wings flapped a beat until they were free of the straps and comfortable. “It went… okay, I think. It was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. I’m not even sure it was the right thing to do… but it feels good. Weird that I felt so guilty about it - it’s not like I know Catra. Or owe her anything.”

“But you did it! I’m still so impressed you went through with it at all. Talking about feelings has never been your strong suit.”

“That’s not true!”

Bow gave an inverted shrug. “Well you don’t enjoy it.”

“Only because I cry so easy without meaning to! I’m not even sad a lot of the time - it just happens! People don’t take me seriously. Mom’s always saying it takes stronger face to lead.”

“Glimmer, I love your Mom but we both know that’s some bullshit. Being in touch with your emotions doesn’t make you weak. And your Mom knows that better than most, but she’s got her own stuff to deal with.”

“It’s not that I’m too in touch with them, it’s like I can’t control them sometimes.”

“Don’t try to control them. Just don’t let them control you. There’s a difference.”

Glimmer smiled. “Thanks, Bow. What do you think of the dress?”

“You look like a snack. Who are you trying to impress?”

Glimmer sighed and looked herself over. “Myself, honestly.”

“Admirable. I’m taking the time to focus on myself too, I think. Wanna go together?”

“You’re giving up on Seahawk?”

“The man is straight, Glimmer. Like for real, straight. It’s weird and unhealthy for me to spend so much time thinking about his stupid hot face. Plus it seems like things are finally going well between Mermista and him.”

“What about Perfuma?”

Bow flipped down off the bed. “I don’t know. She didn’t seem interested. Maybe I’m not her type?”

Glimmer chuckled. “Try growing a beard, maybe?”

“Ew. No. I’ll grow a tail before I grow a beard.”

Two knocks snapped at the door, and Adora’s voice called through to the pair in Glimmer’s room. “Hey guys,” she said.

“Come in,” Glimmer called. The door swung open. Adora stood easily in the door. Catra scowled around her shoulder. 

“Oh! Uh, hi!” Said Bow. “Come in, I guess?” He rubbed his chest, where three ropy scars marked his brush with death at the hands of the glowering girl behind his friend.

Adora dragged Catra inside, and stopped at the sight of Glimmer’s opalescent gown. Bow watched Adora blush briefly, and caught a wave of tension that suddenly radiated from Catra. She stood sullenly. Jealous, awkward, and confused. 

“Wait till you see my dress,” Bow joked, trying to stamp out the sparks in the room. He put out his hand for Catra, making sure that it was the right one. “You already know me,” he said to her. “And I already know you.”

“Yeah,” Adora said, “I guess as far as introductions go I don’t really have to do much.”

Glimmer took Catra’s hand too. “It’s nice to meet you properly.”

Catra looked down at her with narrowed eyes, and there was a sharp moment in which Catra seemed like a coin on its edge. “Why do you look so good,” she said.

Glimmer didn’t respond. Instead, Bow sidled up behind her, and the pair of them narrowed their eyes at the newcomer. 

“Hmmm,” said Glimmer.

“Yeah…” said Bow.

“Hey, Adora?” Catra asked, voice wavering. “Why are they looking at me like that?”

Adora knew what her friends were up to. “Oh no. I’m so sorry, Catra.” She giggled. “I shouldn’t have brought you here.”

Bow took Glimmer’s hands. “I can see it now! A red, no-! Black dress. Short?”

Glimmer nodded. “A reverse on the looks from the Princess Prom Catra came to years ago! Everyone's gonna be talking about it.”

“That’s cute as fuck,” Bow said, turning back to a confused Catra. “You’re coming with me. We’re making you over.”  
Bow dragged Catra out of the room, leaving Adora and Glimmer alone, together. 

“The dress is good,” Adora said matter-of-factly.

Glimmer scoffed. “Don’t make this weird, you dweeb. You have any idea what you’re wearing yet?”

“Didn’t Bow just put you in charge of that?”

“Do you even own a suit?”

“Glimmer, I wear training clothes basically all day, everyday. I can summon my best outfit on demand.”

“Then I'll figure something else out. Hey-” Glimmer took Adora’s hand. “-don’t worry. We’re cool.”

Adora sighed. “Sorry, Glimmer. When I brought her back, I never stopped to think about what this was gonna be like for you… I really am selfish, huh?”

“Sometimes. But you’re working on it. You excited for the Gala?”

“Nervous. Feels like something’s gonna go wrong.”

Glimmer went back behind the changing screen. “As if you’d prefer everything running smoothly...” A measuring tape flew over the screen and landed in Adora’s lap. “Take your measurements again. It’s been a while since we’ve dressed you up.”


	7. Ride or Die, Adora

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adora and Glimmer talk about love. Bow and Catra are fashionably late to the Gala. The attraction between Adora and Catra brings them together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I think i fixed my issues with this one now. See you in a week! Remember you can follow my twitter for updates! Also, be prepared for sex in this one.
> 
> P.S: I really appreciate feedback; I'm still learning! I want to know what works and what doesn't, especially in explicit scenes!

Adora and Catra didn’t see each other again for the rest of the night. 

The next day, the Gala began early. Dignitaries arrived, and Adora spent the morning with Glimmer glad-handing. 

They attended formal lunch, held as a greeting for several parties newly interested in joining the Princess Alliance. Queen Angella had places set for both of them at her side. Glimmer wore blue, Adora wore pink. Bow had a place set for him, but was nowhere to be seen. 

Adora turned to Glimmer slowly, a forkful of potato in her mouth. “You don’t think she killed him do you?”

Glimmer shook her head no, and then deliberated a moment. She shook her head no again, and said: “No, but if she did, he went out doing what he loved.”

“Dressing up gay girls?”

Glimmer laughed into her drink. “I meant shopping.”

“What does he love more do you think, archery or shopping?”

“Shopping for archery supplies.”

Adora nodded sagely, and Queen Angella leant in between them to enter the conversation. “Actually, Bow’s absence is my doing, girls.”

Glimmer cocked her head. “What do you mean, Mom?”

“I had something to give Catra. A welcoming gift. I asked Bow to pick it up, and help her with it.”

“Help her with it?” Glimmer asked.

“I expect you’ll see it at the dance,” Angella said, and left the conversation again, using her crystal goblet to hide the flash of mirth on her lips. 

***

Night fell, a banquet began and ended, and still there was no sign of Bow and Catra. Adora and Glimmer went and changed into their evening outfits. 

They changed together, unashamed, and - after spending the day together - unburdened by complicated feelings. Adora felt that they had found equilibrium as friends again.

Glimmer slipped into her silver-satin backless gown, and started helping Adora with her suit. 

“I’m lucky I’ve got you,” Adora said, looking down at Glimmer, who was fixing her bowtie. “I didn’t really know how any sort of real relationship was supposed to work after I left the Horde. The learning curve has been... steep.”

“Stop monologuing while I do this,” Glimmer said in mock frustration.

Adora laughed and waited for her to pull away, before finishing her thought. “I just mean I didn’t know for the longest time that you could even be friends with someone like this. We’ve always been close, but when we broke up, I really thought I’d ruined things between us. Forever. But… us being friends seems like it can kind of ignore all that. I guess I’m saying I hope you feel the same way.”

“Hm,” Glimmer said. “Not ignore it. Learn from, maybe.” She gave Adora a tight hug around the waist. “But yes, you can date your friends and then break up with them, and still be cool. It helps that you literally can’t get away from me. We see each other every day. And the war doesn’t seem like it’s ending anytime soon.”

Adora hugged back. “I’m still learning so much about love. There’s so many different kinds of it.”

“Yeah,” Glimmer said, smiling into her chest. “Ride or die, Adora.”

***

The first hour of the dance went by - still no Catra. Castle Brightmoon’s ballroom filled out fast as guests from all over Etheria started pouring in. Soon enough, it was so full that Adora couldn’t even see where the great white pillars intersected with the navy-tiled floor. The lights dimmed, and the ballroom was lit by flickering globes hanging the air above the dancers.

Adora started to get nervous about Catra and Bow again, despite Angella’s reassurances. 

And there was no asking the Queen now - she was long gone, deep into the war effort meetings she’d scheduled herself. Many of the visiting parties had asked to speak with the legendary She-Ra, and Angella had held them at bay by going in Adora's stead. The Queen had taken her aside that evening, and told her that she’d need to speak with them before they left, but for now, her job was to “show the younger guests how to have fun. Blow off some steam.”

Adora felt like a boiling kettle. The suit was hot, but every time she’d tried to loosen the bowtie, Glimmer slapped her hand lightly. “It’s too early! You can undo it later. It’s a late night look, Adora. It needs time to _evolve._ ”

So, Adora drank two glasses of punch back to back, and watched Glimmer waltz with one of the visiting princesses. It was one of the last of the formal dances. One she'd have liked to take part in herself.

When Catra and Bow arrived, the whole ballroom noticed. A dance had just ended, and currents of bodies rushed against each other as partners swapped, cups refilled, and the main doors opened. 

The pair were dressed darkly; Bow wore a black suit, down to the brogues. He sauntered up to Adora, and said, “one of us is gonna have to change.”

Adora ignored him. Catra wore a short black dress, pointed flats, and her wild hair partially up. 

Outfit aside, Catra was also wearing the Queen’s gift; a new prosthetic arm. It was pearl-white, soft edged, crafted so well it could have been a piece of art.

She looked… incredible. Adora couldn’t stop staring.

Catra would have had her hands in her pockets if she’d had any. “Hey, Adora,” she said. 

Adora turned to Bow, and handed them both drinks. “How did you get her to wear this?”

Catra answered. “We cut a deal. He sold his soul to me.”

Bow shrugged. “I did what I had to do. Tried to trade her Swift Wind in exchange for learning to walk in heels, but he kept escaping.”

“Well, good job. She looks amazing.”

Catra blushed, and her fur prickled. “I’m standing right here.” 

“It really wasn’t that bad,” Bow went on. “We actually have a lot in common. Like… well I can’t think of anything now, but we had a rapport. Especially after she said sorry for trying to tear my heart out that one time. Haha! Fun times... We got along though, didn’t we?” He looked back to Catra.

She snickered and sipped the punch. “It wasn’t so bad after we laid some ground rules-” Catra stopped and eyed her drink. “What the hell is this?”

“The punch?” Adora asked. ‘You like it?”

“You’re telling me this drink is called _punch_? That’s cool! Is there a piledriver drink? Or a suplex drink?”

“I’m sure we can make one,” Adora said, offering her arm. “There’s an open bar.”

Catra’s new, alabaster hand reached out and slipped under Adora’s elbow.

Bow watched them leave, and Glimmer appeared behind him. “They grow up so fast,” he said. 

***

Adora was the happiest she could ever remember being. She knew walking around with Catra on her arm was drawing looks. She didn’t care. Word would get back to Angella, but she would deal with that then. For now, feeling Catra close to her was the only thing she cared about. 

“You look good,” Catra said sullenly, after a drink or two, as they took places on the dance-floor together. “I didn’t think you could pull off a suit.”

“You look good too,” Adora said. The steps began. She scooped a hand behind Catra, pulled her close, and led.

“You weren’t just saying that?”

“No! Do you not think you look good?”

“I feel ridiculous.”

“Well, I think you look great.” 

Adora spun Catra to her arm's length, and as she did, heard Catra mutter “...and it’s all about what you think, isn’t it?”

Adora pulled her back, ready to argue, but found Catra waiting for her with a sly grin. Teasing. 

Adora smirked. “Finally back to your old self, huh?” 

Catra put her fingertips on Adora’s shoulder muscles. “Yeah, I guess. I’m starting to loosen up now I’ve been here a while. I’m still not loving it, but at least I’ve got you around for entertainment.”

“More like the other way around,” Adora challenged. 

Catra grinned. “Leaving the Horde made you mouthy. I’m not so sure I like it.”

“You’ll learn to.”

Catra swallowed hard. “I knew you’d like the dress. It’s the only reason I’m wearing it.” She watched Adora’s unpatched eye flicker up and down her body. “But don’t get used to it. It’s a one-off,” Catra sneered. 

There was a sudden dramatic stab in the music, and Catra felt Adora’s strong hands guide her into a dip. They locked eyes, and Catra shivered at the sight of Adora panting like a wolf. 

The crowd cheered as the dance ended, and the throng of those watching rushed in to the dancefloor like the tide coming in. “What’s happening?” Catra asked, still clutching Adora’s arms.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ntYCQculZo

New music began; slow, dark, and driving. “Oh, the formal dancing’s over,” Adora said. 

Catra watched with interest as the floor filled with people dancing to the steady rhythm that was slowly building up around them. They all started doing… whatever they felt like, apparently. It was mesmerising. She’d never seen people moving in such a way. 

“Can you do that?” She asked, pointing to the dancers.

“What, this?” Adora untied her bow tie and started swaying. 

Catra was deeply suspicious of everything that was happening, but at the same time, it looked _fun._ She didn’t even realise she was moving along with the beat herself at first. She let go and stopped thinking, swept up in the crowd, Adora by her side. They twisted in the dark.

Then the music shifted like the changing of the wind, and there was a moment of pure silence, before it all crashed back into Catra’s ears like a roll of thunder. Catra cackled at the madness of it all. 

“I should have left the Horde ages ago!” she screamed at Adora over the noise. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW3IdfaIESU

The glittering lights seemed to flash in time too, and on every other count Catra saw Adora silhouetted by shimmering color, and it was as though the way she moved had some sort of control over her. Catra blinked and gasped for air as she watched her partner dancing, and she felt it spur her on, and she did nothing to stop it. 

Looking around, Catra saw other dancers doing things that made her blood run hot. She wanted to do that for Adora. It was simple instinct. She pushed herself up against Adora’s body, taking cues from other people around her. With every risk taken, Adora’s eye lit up, and Catra tasted victory. 

“You really did miss me, huh?” Catra teased. “You know, you’ve always been so easy to manipulate…”

“Catra…” Adora said, gritting her teeth.

Catra felt Adora’s hands moving across her little dress. “Hmm…” Catra replied, enjoying winding her partner up, “I like hearing my name like that… but maybe with a title. I think now I’m here helping you I need some sort of official position.”

“I have a position in mind.”

“Oh, really?” Catra pulled away. “I wonder if we’re on the same page. I was thinking I’d be somewhere above you. Where I belong-”

Catra barely finished the sentence before Adora grabbed her wrist, jerked her close, and kissed her.

Catra’s heart pounded. It seemed unreal. Adora bit her lower lip, and Catra's eyes went wide. 

As they broke away from each other, Catra looked up at Adora, and said, honestly: “Things would have been so much easier if I never loved you.”

Adora nodded, and took Catra’s hands. “We should go to my room.”

***

The moment they were in the door, they started pulling at each other’s clothes. The blazer and bow-tie were easy, but Catra’s hands shook too much for her to undo Adora’s buttons, and the dress was too complicated in the half-light for Adora to figure out the straps - she gave up after half a second and simply scooped Catra up off the ground, marched her to the bed, and threw her in. Catra yelped in surprise.

Adora undid her own buttons, watching Catra’s face intently. It was mixed; trepidation, nerves, intrigue, lust. Her tail swished back and forward slowly. Adora had long ago learned to keep an eye on it to see what was really on Catra’s mind. 

Adora let her shirt fall, and grabbed Catra’s dress at the hem, pulling it up and off in one motion. Catra put her arms up to accommodate, and then clutched them across herself in self-consciousness. She was wearing simple underwear under the dress - no bra.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6rUS_GnOLI

Adora smirked. “Cute,” she said. “Relax.”

“Okay… I really don’t know what I’m doing, so… you just tell me what to do.”

Adora let her hair down, and put her hands on her hips. “You want me to order you around?”

“No!” Catra said. “I mean… just so I learn.”

“Then start with my belt.”

Catra crawled forward and undid Adora’s belt. Adora pushed her back into the bed the moment it was gone. They struggled out of the last of their clothes and then softened against each other. 

“Wait,” Catra said, and Adora stopped, and waited. Catra put a claw under the eyepatch, and pulled it free. The scar beneath broke Catra’s heart, but she wanted Adora naked. “Keep going,” she said. 

Adora reached for the clasps attaching Catra’s alabaster arm, but Catra pulled away. “Leave it… I can feel with this one.”

“Really?”

“Uh-huh,”

Adora ran her finger tips over the prosthetic palm. “Can you feel that?” Catra nodded. Adora pulled Catra’s hand down, and in between her legs. “Can you feel that?” 

Catra nodded again. “Yeah…”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zd2E9QCF7wc

This time, the kiss was slow. Careful. Catra felt Adora’s lips on the corners of her own, and then on her neck, her collarbones… Adora kissed constellations down her body. 

The anticipation made Catra’s jugular thump uncontrollably. There came a point where she felt like she might pass out, and the idea was so embarrassing that it started a feedback loop which threatened to unbalance her, and then Adora kissed the inside of her thigh and she felt her body loosen and unwind, like coiled steel.

Adora’s face dipped between Catra's legs. 

Her eyelids drifted shut, and then a jolt shot through her. 

Catra's hands slid down and raked through Adora's hair, pulling her closer, urging her on. Adora gently put a finger inside her, and then pressed up, over and over and over. Catra gasped in desperate bliss.

She started to get nervous about how long it was taking. “Adora..." she said, and then when she heard the reply - a soft, muffled, "mhmm?" she didn't have to worry about it anymore. Catra clutched Adora's bobbing head, twisting a hand through the hair. "I think I'm gonna..." and the second the admission had been processed in her brain, it started. Catra pointed her legs up in the air, murmured nothing, feeling herself squeezing Adora's finger in waves.

Catra lay back, panting, with one arm thrown up over her face. She felt Adora moving on the bed around her. 

“Hey, Catra.”

She opened her eyes and found Adora straddling her, hips over her face. 

“My turn,” Adora said.


	8. A Coin on Its Edge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catra wakes up to a world in which she no longer knows what to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short update, but i'm really proud of this one... :D hope you enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJSoec3r-EI

Catra woke drowsy in Adora’s arms. Midday sun lay over them in bars. Adora’s room was near the top of Castle Brightmoon, and the windows stood ajar, white blinds rustling in a breeze that ruffled the fur on Catra’s legs and midriff. 

She remembered the night in pieces. Soon enough, it was all there in her head, but it seemed unreal. Part of her was worried it had been a dream, but the room was real, the bed was real. Adora’s soft breathing, tangled hair, and pale bare shoulders were real. 

Catra felt a strange lightness; she’d wondered what it would be like to be in Brightmoon, and do the things she’d done the previous night, and to have actually done them… she hadn’t just slept with Adora, she’d confessed love. The reality she’d woken up to was terrifying, but also made her feel like she was flying, free, giddy with an independence she’d never really known in the Fright Zone. 

Adora’s room had a balcony, and a small shape flapped down to the balustrade. Catra saw it outlined behind thin white curtains.

Groggily, she untangled herself from bed and stood, stretching, tripping over their fallen clothes. She hurriedly put on Adora’s shirt, bottom buttons done so it covered her - somewhat - and went out onto the balcony. 

Imp blinked at her, glimmering yellow eyes squinting in the harsh sun. Catra pushed the door behind her shut just as Imp’s mouth opened. 

_“Catra…”_ came Hordak’s voice. _“You have done well.”_

“Thank you, Lord Hordak.”

_“We see your infiltration proceeds at pace - I wanted to congratulate you. And remind you not to lose sight of our goal.”_

“As if I would. You sent me for a reason, didn't you?”

A dark laugh rattled from Imp’s throat. _“Continue to win their trust, Force Commander. I will be in touch again soon.”_

The door slid open, and Imp scuttled backward off the balcony railing and down the wall. Catra spun around and found Adora standing among the curtains, hair still down, undressed. 

“Where you talking to someone out here?” she asked, bleary eyed.

Catra shook her head. “Just looking at the scenery.” A cold snake of guilt wrapped around her insides. Should she tell the truth? Catra suddenly wanted to turn back time, but the moment passed. She remained unsure, a coin on its edge.

Adora smiled and jumped out to stand with Catra in the sun. “You like it? It’s pretty out here.”

“Adora!” Catra couldn’t believe she was walking around naked.

“Oh, psh- no-one can see us up here anyway.” She went to the balcony’s edge and looked across the Whispering Wood, letting the breeze catch her fringe. 

Beneath her, Imp sat and listened.

“I love the view out here," Adora went on. "It just goes on and on... and I've seen so much more of it up close now that I ever did working for the Horde. I can tell you what that is, what those mountains are..." she trailed off for a moment. "You know, I used to love the view in the Fright Zone too - finding a rooftop to watch the lights with you was one of my favourite things. I used to think about it a lot when I first came out here. I would sit out on this balcony and watch the the stars, and wonder if you were doing the same thing back home.”

“Home,” Catra repeated.

“Yeah,” Adora said. “Brightmoon is home now, but it wasn’t for a long time.”

“How long?”

“...not until last night.”

Catra felt herself falling deeper in love. “That’s bullshit. You made that up.” She drifted closer to Adora, still facing away from her, looking over the edge. Adora had five thin pink scratches up her muscular back. “Did I do that to you?” Catra asked, tracing them with her fingers. Adora shivered. 

“Yeah,” Adora said, turning in place, and putting her back on the rail. “But I kinda liked it.” 

Catra smirked. “Oh yeah?” her left claws extended, and she put one of them under Adora’s chin. 

Adora grabbed Catra’s wrist and kissed her, feeling Catra go limp under her touch. 

Catra blinked, dazed. “What was that for?”

“Re-establishing dominance. Plus, you look cute in my shirt.” Catra blushed. “You wanna get brunch?” Adora finished.

“What’s brunch?”


	9. Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The shadows of Adora's decisions lengthen as the sun goes down.

Brunch, it turned out, was good. 

Catra felt as though she was tagging along, and even though Adora made it clear she was invited, still felt an unsettling dread before they met Bow and Glimmer at a cafe on the Brightmoon promenade. 

But once they had arrived, the dread passed. The late breakfast made Catra feel alive again, and she listened to Adora and her friends talk, strangely at ease with the situation, happy to just listen, and secretly sitting atop a pillar of pride - she knew that everyone else would have seen Adora take her away last night. 

“So,” Bow was saying, “we still doing this?”

It took Catra a moment to realise he was addressing her. “Huh?” she said. 

Adora glanced between them. “What’s this?” she smirked. “Secrets?”

“Oh!” Catra remembered, the terms of the deal she made with Bow to behave rising back to the surface of her mind. “I forgot!” she said happily, a wicked grin slowly spreading over her face.

“Uh oh” Bow said. “Really making me regret my decisions, huh?”

Glimmer poured a glass of juice, concerned. “What’s going on?”

Bow cleared his throat. “Catra agreed to let me dress her for the party under a condition… I said she could, uh-”

“-no fucking way-” Glimmer shook her head in disbelief. 

“-she gets _three_ shots. Only.”

Catra drummed her hands. “Can I shoot it in here?”

“No!” Glimmer put her juice down. “Bow, I can’t believe you’ve done this. This was on the list of things for you not to do!”

“Yeah, well.” Bow caught Adora’s eye. “It was worth it, right?”

Adora blushed at her brunch. 

***

Around midday, Bow took Catra to Brightmoon’s archery range. Adora watched them run through the basics, and Glimmer gave up and left within seconds. 

“Call me if it turns out to be a disaster. Actually... don’t.” She said, vanishing in a shimmering cloud.

Adora looked back just in time to see Catra take her first shot - it fell short. Adora was just near enough to hear Catra’s frustration, and see Bow showing her holes in her technique. Catra nocked a second arrow, looked over her shoulder at Adora, and let it fly. 

It bit deep into the middle of the target. Bow exclaimed, pointing at the success, calling to Adora. “Did you see that?” she heard him say from afar. 

Catra nocked another, and took aim, looking again to Adora before making her shot, but stopped. Lowered the arrow slowly, looking through Adora. Above her. 

Adora turned. Queen Angella descended behind her, wings outstretched, flanked by the royal guard. Adora made to smile and bow, but Angella gave a curt shake of her head, and Adora realised something was wrong. 

Adora looked back to Catra, who was being taken away by another group of royal guards, along with a confused and apprehensive Bow. 

“Adora,” the Queen said. “I’m disappointed.”

Adora grit her teeth. “Disappointed that I followed my heart? I don’t understand.”

“Disappointed that you couldn’t reign yourself in and wait until the dignitaries had gone. The ones you were supposed to meet this morning, or had you forgotten?”

She had. “I-”

“They heard about yourself and Catra carrying on at the gala. I told you; optics. You cost us allies.”

“But-”

“I had your back on this Adora. I wish you’d have had mine, too.”

***

Later that night, Adora waited outside the throne room of Brightmoon Castle, sitting idly in one of the tall-backed gold chairs lining the corridor. The moon rose outside, and the light played over the blade of the Sword of Protection, resting on her thighs. 

She still hadn’t decided what she wanted to say to Catra when she got out - the doors opened unceremoniously, Catra walked out, and they closed again. 

“Sorry,” Adora offered. 

Catra scoffed. “Sure,” she said, but took Adora’s hand wordlessly as they walked away together. Catra’s alabaster arm was gone. She sighed. “I don’t think people’re ever gonna trust me out here. I think… I probably shouldn’t stay here.”

 

“No,” Adora said, pulling Catra out onto a moonlit balcony. Adora kissed her, gently. “I don’t want you to go again.”

“You don’t get it.” Catra pulled away. “I’m- this whole situation is so stupid. I’m still working for the Horde,” she blurted, and instantly she felt a deep fear grip her tightly. “I… she knows. The Queen. I mean- she doesn’t, but she’s gonna figure me out. She already doesn’t trust me. And- I can’t do this. I can’t do this to you. And now you probably think-”

“-I knew.”

“Huh?” Catra looked up. Adora was smiling.

“I lived with the Horde a long time, remember? Of course you’re working for Hordak. I told you that day in the infirmary. I don’t care. I believe in what the rebellion is doing, one hundred percent. But I care about you more.”

Catra blinked. “You knew?”

“Yeah. I thought- I thought…”

“You thought I’d defect from the Horde if it meant being with you.”

“Was I right?”

“Maybe, but we can’t be together here, either.”

“Well, maybe we don’t need to be here,” Adora said, and Catra started to grasp the vastness of the situation. She had the doubt she needed to turn Adora back to the Horde. She could do it. She knew she could. All she had to do was pull her close, kiss her, manipulate her into coming home.  
But Catra pulled Adora into a loose hug instead, and looked out into the night sky, toward the Moonstone, floating on its tower above the lake. “I don’t want to go back to the Horde…” she whispered, and Adora squeezed her.

“We could just leave for a while.” Adora thought aloud. “Visit the other kingdoms. Come back once the politics have died down-” she stopped, feeling Catra’s claw in her side. “What’s wrong?”

Catra pointed out to the Moonstone, and Adora strained her good eye to see the figure moving about on the Brightmoon Runestone’s tower. A shadow. The thing from the village.


	10. The Red Knight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Currents begin to diverge

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLzYAteddO0

“It followed us?” Catra asked, as she and Adora ran over the Moonstone tower bridge - long and thin, bowed above the lake below. It’s arches pulsed up and down as the pair dashed along it. 

“It must have!” Adora said. “We gotta get up there!”

Catra grabbed Adora’s wrist. “I don’t have my arm! And you don’t have your sword.”

Adora stopped. “You’re right - and last time you nearly got killed.” She put two fingers between her lips and whistled.

Catra covered her ears. “How is that gonna help us?”

They waited for a second, and then a pale figure rose out of the deep blue night beneath them. Adora cupped her hands and shouted up at Swift Wind, as he looped around the bridge. “Swifty! Down here!”

He dropped onto the white tile. “Sup? Emergency battle?”

“Emergency battle. You bring the Sword-”

“-of Protection? You got it.” The alicorn drew the blade from under his wing with his teeth, and tossed it deftly to Adora. 

“Good job - now go find Catra’s arm.”

“What? Angella has it!”

“The other one!”

Swift Wind balked. “That’s worse; it’s locked in the armory! There’s… guards and stuff!”

“We don’t have time Swift Wind! Please, get the arm, tell GLimmer what’s going on, get help, and meet us up top!”

He took a breath, “got it,” and dove backward off the bridge. 

Adora looked over at Catra. “You’ll be fine until he gets back, right?”

She bared her fangs. “You transformed into an eight foot warrior princess, and me down a limb? I think we’ll be about even.”

Adora held the blade aloft.

“For the Honour of Grayskull!”

***

When they reached the top, the Shadow was idly staring at Castle Brightmoon’s Runestone. It didn’t quite look like Shadow Weaver anymore - the suggestion was there, but it’s form flickered in the light. 

She-Ra pointed the blade. “Turn and face us, creature!”

It did so, and both She-Ra and Catra were shocked to their core to hear it speak. The voice emanated from the shadow like waves of a tuning fork plunged into water. It sounded like hot metal being coated in pitch. 

_“She-Ra,”_ it said. _“We meet again.”_

“You can talk?”

 _“I… have learned,”_ it said. _“From you. And others.”_

She-Ra and Catra shared a glance, and Catra spoke up. “What are you?”

The creature looked at its hands, shifting in shape, and stark black under the wan light of the Moonstone. _“The Shadow Seeker,”_ it said. _“But I have chosen a name.”_ The creature looked back up to the pair, and began to melt into a pool of inky darkness. 

She-Ra gripped the hilt of her blade reflexively, and tried to put herself between the pool of shadow and Catra. From the pool stepped a tall, feminine figure. _“My name is Xax,”_ it said. _“And I am here to kill you both.”_

The figure melted into the pool again, and bunched up into a dark coil, before snaking along the platform toward them. 

“Careful!” She-Ra called. “It’s trying to surround us!” The pool split in two, flanking the companions, and putting them back to back. 

From the flat plane of gloom rose two new figures. 

“You’ve gotta be kidding me…” Catra groaned. 

Before her stood a tall, warrior princess - umbral, like she was made of event horizon. The Shadow She-Ra held a blade just as long and sharp as the Sword of Protection. Catra looked over her shoulder, and saw hunched before the real She-Ra sat an eerie copy of herself - a Catra with no features save for two white, piercing eyes, and ten long claws, extending far enough to brush the ground. 

Swift Wind flashed by overhead, and Catra’s arm sailed down the sky. She reached up to grab it. “Perfect timing,” she said strapping it on as fast as she could. “You ready?”

She-Ra nodded curtly, shivering at the thought of striking down the Shadow-Catra that lurked right in front of her, clicking sharp talons together…

***

“What’s going on?” Bow dashed up the stairs behind Glimmer, leading the way up the corkscrew stairs to the Moonstone Tower.

“Swift Wind just said Adora was in danger!” Glimmer called back.

They broke out onto the Runestone platform, and struggled to understand the scene before them. 

She-Ra and Catra fought side-by-side, and it seemed like they were fighting shadows of each other. As Bow and Glimmer arrived, the shadows seemed to recoil, sensing that they were becoming outnumbered. Bow nocked an arrow, and fired it into the neck of the shadowy She-Ra pinning Catra to the ground. It lowered it’s blade and turned slowly to him, pale eyes unblinking, before it melted into nothing, and the arrow clattered to the ground, clean. 

The Shadow-Catra froze, and She-Ra took the chance to plunge her glowing sword through its heart. It looked down at the blade, then up at her, and melted. 

Bow clapped her on the back. “You did it!”

“No,” she told him, wiping her grazed chin.“They’re not dead. This is what happened last time.”

Glimmer blinked to Catra’s side. “Are you okay?” Catra shrugged her off. “Those things,” Glimmer went on. “They’re Horde, right?”

Catra spat blood from the fight. “Supposed to be something Shadow Weaver made, but I’m not so sure anymore.”

Glimmer propped Catra up. “Let’s get all of you back inside.”

***

“Run that all by me one more time.” Scorpia scratched her head, trying her best to pay attention to Entrapta’s lecture. 

“Of course!” Entrapta exclaimed. “I’d love to go over it. Studies show hearing something six times in a row can really aid retention. Or was it ‘dissension’? Anyway, as I was saying, my experiments into space-time have yielded results!”

“Okay,” Scorpia said, following Entrapta around the tall box she’d built in the centre of her workshop. 

“We - as in you and I - are in an alternate timeline!”

“Nope, you lost me again.”

“Allow me to give you an example, friend Scorpia. Say time is like a river-”

“-a what?-”

“-and if one was able to dam it, its course would change. Now, in the case of time, the dam has to be of significant magnitude; it would require a lot of energy to make such a change, and would be impossible to control precisely - much more likely that the splitting of time is a by product of some event in our past that involved massive amounts of world changing energy…”

“...princess prom?”

“No! But I understand why you would go there! I’m talking about the Battle of Brightmoon! The nexus of energy created by our, uh… _meddling_ with the Runestones divided the timeline. Everything that’s happened since then is a little _off_. There’s another way things are _supposed_ to go!”

“Hmm,” Scorpia rubbed her chin. “In this ‘other way things are supposed to go,’ are me and Catra still best friends?”

“We have no way to know! But I’d imagine so, yes.”

“Then... should we be trying to get back there?”

“Who knows? I built this machine to replicate some of the energy signatures we sent across Etheria back during the battle - we plug it into your Runestone and maybe we can reverse what happened, but will we remember the last few years? Will this timeline just cease to exist? There’s only one way to find out!”

Entrapta leapt at the ignition lever, but Scorpia snatched her out of the air with a claw. “Hold on! Shouldn’t we tell Catra about all this first? Seems a little hasty to be pulling mystery levers without her.”

“Hmm,” Entrapta dangled a few feet off the floor. “I suppose you could try to warn her. I could do more trials.”

Scorpia gently put the princess down. “Then it’s settled! I go get Catra, you don’t pull the lever! Unless something happens to us. Then just pull it, I guess.”

“Got it!”

***

The deepest hour of night passed by, and the moon began to set, sinking into Brightmoon Lake like melting ice. Bow and Glimmer both shivered in the eerie night air as they helped Adora and Catra back across the Moonstone Tower bridge, heading for the infirmary. 

Swift Wind tumbled from the air, landing on his hooves at an angle, and stumbling over the risky descent. 

Glimmer let Adora go to his side and stroke his mane, “thanks buddy,” she told him. 

“Don’t mention it,” he said nervously. “But we might want to… I don’t know… go someplace else a while…”

Adora sighed. “I know I told you to break Catra’s arm out of the armory, but what exactly did you do?”

Several ranks of the Brightmoon Guard marched across the bridge, forming a wall behind Swift Wind, and blocking entry to the castle. 

“Ms Adora,” their captain called. “We have been asked to escort you to the Queen.”

Adora’s grip on the reigns tightened. 

“Sorry,” said Swift Wind. “I made them mad.”

Glimmer could see quickly what was happening, and she tried to make an appeal. “Adora, please,” she said, “don’t go.”

Bow looked between them. “What? What’s happening?”

Adora beckoned for Catra to follow, and no one took a breath as Catra crossed the bridge, wide-eyed, and took Adora’s hand. 

“I’m sorry,” Adora said to Glimmer and Bow. “We’ll be back. We just can’t be here right now.”

“No, Adora,” Glimmer said, tears in her eyes. “We can talk to my Mom about this! She’ll understand.”

“She won’t.” Adora turned away - it hurt to see Glimmer upset. Adora and Catra got onto Swift Wind’s back. Some of the guards moved forward to stop them, but Bow held out a hand. 

“Let them go,” he said, and they moved back. Glimmer stared back at him, betrayed. Bow put his hands on her shoulders. “Glimmer… we gotta trust her. She’ll come back.”

Adora looked back down at Glimmer one last time. “I’m sorry,” she said again, and Swift Wind beat his wings once, leaping from the bridge, and sailing away on the moonlight, over the Whispering Wood.

***

Far above, from a balcony near the top of Castle Brightmoon, Queen Angella watched the distant alicorn winging away over the woods, a dark black outline against the wan light of the moon. A figure stood behind her. 

“You were right,” the Queen said sadly. “I pushed her away.”

“No,” the figure stepped forward - an eight foot knight in full, gleaming red plate armor. “It isn’t your fault, your Majesty. This is simply how things happen in this timeline.”

Angella turned to the red knight. “When you first came here and explained yourself, I’ll admit that I didn’t believe you. But so much has happened recently that seems… odd. I find myself thinking you must be right; we exist in a world where things are not as they should be.”

The red knight nodded, clinking in their armor. “Yes. If these differences in time were harmless, it would hardly matter. Alas, in the future of this timeline, there is only disaster, and it begins with Adora and Catra.”

“Should I have tried harder to keep them apart?” Angella mused.

“I don’t think anything can keep them apart. Their fates are entwined - no timeline exists in which they are not together in some sense. No, it is not them being together that causes the end of all things, it is the nature in which they arrive there. For their relationship to work, they need to heal properly.”

“And how does that happen?”

“I don’t know. But not like this.”

Angella turned to the red knight, trying to see under the visor, suspicious. The voice was deep and gravelly, though she could tell it was a magical disguise. That aside, something about the knight was familiar. Angella swore she recognized the way the knight moved and spoke. 

“You never told me,” the Queen said, “in the future that you came from, what is this disaster caused by Adora and Catra?”

The red knight went to the edge of the balcony, and watched them disappear over the horizon. “The death of She-Ra.”

***

Sleet began to fall on the forest, and Adora found a deep cave for shelter. Swift Wind refused to enter it, and found a fallen tree on the forest floor to sleep under. 

They lit a fire, watched the smoke roll up the roof and out of the caves mouth, and listened to the rain outside. 

“Hey, Adora?” Catra said softly. 

“Yeah?”

“I- I guess I didn’t think you would do that.”

“Neither did I, really,” Adora admitted. She held Catra’s hand. “But we’re here now.”

“Yeah. Hey, I’m sorry, I guess. You liked that place. I messed it up for you.”

“It’s okay. I’ll go back. I still have to be She-Ra…”

“I guess you do.”

Adora sighed. “I… wish I didn’t. I wish I could just be with you. I’m sick of fighting. My whole life in the Horde, and then I get out and fighting just becomes more important than ever. But if I give up, the Horde takes Etheria.”

Catra didn’t feel like she had much to say. She mostly felt guilt. Guilt that she was happy to have Adora to herself. Guilt that she didn’t really care what happened to Etheria beyond the cave they sat in - if Adora stopped being She-Ra and the Horde won, that was fine by Catra, so long as she and Adora stayed together forever. Of course, Adora would never be truly happy in a world run by the Horde. So Catra said nothing. Adora had already said everything there was to say.

Where are we going?”

“To figure out what to do next. I have a friend in the woods who can help us.”

They sat together silently for a while. Catra put her head on Adora’s shoulder, and closed her eyes. The low roar of the woods nearly put her to sleep.

“This is nice,” Catra said, and then, against her better judgment. “Adora… do you love me?”

Adora shifted beneath her, pushed her away to arms length. A cold moment passed in which Catra thought she’d said something wrong, but Adora pulled Catra close, kissing her hard.

“I love you, Catra,” she said as they broke apart, in no uncertain terms. She pushed Catra down gently. 

Adora’s jacket shielded Catra’s back from the errant rock of the cave floor, and the dying fire filled the space with dusk. Catra panted for air as Adora’s kisses left her mouth and trailed down her neck.

They huddled close by the fire, struggling gingerly against the rock and the cold, building a makeshift nest of discarded clothes. Catra shrugged off her metal arm - it was just getting in the way. 

Adora ran her hands through Catra’s fur, feeling the scars hidden beneath. Her palms came to rest on Catra’s bare knees, before she pushed them apart. 

Catra wrapped her legs shut behind Adora, locking her in, pulling her closer. Adora lowered herself until their foreheads touched, and began to buck her hips into Catra’s. Sweat gathered in the firelight.

“I love you too,” Catra gasped. Things would be okay, she thought, as the rain picked up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Hope you've enjoyed the story - I'm starting a new job soon and won't have time to work on this anymore, so i'm expecting the next one to be the finale, and then will probably go on hiatus. I might pick it up again but I doubt it! Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the next episode!


	11. Time Bomb: Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hordak takes advantage of Adora's absence. Entrapta and Scorpia come up with a plan. Catra helps Adora make a choice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi yall! Looks like i was wrong - I planned out the rest of the story, but the finale doesn't fit into one chapter! So here's an update, and then you should expect at least one more. Will there be more romance next time? probably yes.

Scorpia didn’t have much to pack. Before she left, she made one last call in to see Entrapta, and found in her lab a large object under a blanket. 

“It’s important!” was Entrapta's only explanation for it.

Scorpia frowned at the hidden thing. It was so large it needed a hover-cart beneath it to move. “Can I at least look?” she asked, pinching a corner of the sheet and trying to peer beneath.

“No!” Entrapta said, fiddling with a remote control - as she did, her four legged robot, Emily, slapped Scorpia’s claw away, and hitched itself to the cart, ready to move the secret machine. 

“Why not?”

Entrapta relented, and gave up a little more detail. “I’ve created something which might be able to reverse the timeline splitting effects of the Battle of Brightmoon. And while it won’t explode - if everything works out how I expect it to - it does look somewhat like a bomb. A big one! I don’t want anyone getting confused and stopping Emily and I from plugging it into the Black Garnet when the time comes!”

Scorpia tried to peek under the blanket again. “Does it have a name?”

“I’m thinking… Time Bomb!” Entrapta spread her arms as wide as her sparkling eyes. “It’s not very serious, but neither is my timeline theory!”

Scorpia laughed and slapped Entrapta’s back with a sharp pincer. “Ha! Ah. I get it! That’s funny.”

“I suppose I do have my moments. Now go, friend Scorpia! Find Catra, bring her back here, and together we’ll venture into the unknown!”

Scorpia saluted, even though she was the superior officer, and the door behind them opened. The rank and file of Scorpia’s squadron stood at the threshold. 

“Captain Scorpia?” Lonnie asked. “What are you doin’?"

Scorpia turned and tried to lean nonchalantly on the Time Bomb, which floated away on the hovercart. “Nothing!” she said. “And there’s no bomb under the sheet!”

“Right…” Lonnie knew better than to get involved with anything in Entrapta’s lab. “Well, we’re shipping out.”

“What?” Scorpia was confused. “We are?”

“Most of the Fright Zone is mobilizing. Just got word you’re in command of our squad.”

Scorpia glanced at Entrapta. “Of course!” she said. “Where are we going?”

“Castle Brightmoon.”

***

In the midst of the Whispering Woods, Adora trod ground she’d retraced hundreds of times over the last few years. 

“Here we are again,” she said to Catra, leading her through the wood. “The last time we were here alone was probably that night that started it all. You ever think about it?”

“All the time,” Catra said.

Adora led Catra on a winding path down the side of a great chasm, too narrow for Swift Wind to follow. Sapphire light glinted from the minerals of the cave around them, and over their interlocked hands. 

Adora tried to help Catra down a steep part of the path, but Catra scoffed, snatched back her hand, and scaled down with ease. 

Adora looked down at her. “It’s funny how much I missed you without realising it,” she said.

“We’ve never really been apart, Adora.” Catra paused a while before going on. “When you left, I think part of the reason it hurt so bad was that you took some of me with you.” Adora slid down to Catra’s side, and Catra took her hand again. “Maybe even most of me. The good parts anyway.”

Adora shook her head as the continued down into the cavern. “Don’t say that. Give yourself some credit.”

“No - I’ve done some really bad stuff, Adora. I think… maybe if you knew about all of it, you’d realize I wasn’t really good enough for you.”

Adora stopped and fixed Catra with a steely eye. 

Catra suddenly found herself standing awkwardly on the trail, shivering in the cold breeze. “Don’t blame yourself for what the Horde made you do,” Adora said. “Even if you feel like you did it willingly, you didn’t. Even if you knew they were manipulating you - it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. They used us, but they used you more than anyone. You were always smart enough to know what was going on, but I think that just made it harder for you to cope with the fact they were forcing you to be a soldier. And yet you did. You coped, and for a lot longer than I ever had to. The fact you’re here with me tells me everything I need to know about you, Catra. You’re strong. Stronger than me.”

Catra swallowed and followed silently, blushing. She couldn’t say anything through the lump in her throat, and so squeezed Adora’s hand, and followed. 

“Not physically, of course,” Adora added. “Like, uhh… emotionally.”

Catra sneered. “She-Ra may be stronger than me - but Adora? I don’t think so. Who was reigning arm-wrestle champ in the Fright Zone?”

“You cheated!” Adora said hotly. “And besides, I’m stronger than I was back then.”

“Oh really?” Catra replied. “Could’ve fooled me. I haven’t seen anything impressive out of you recently.”

Adora smirked over her shoulder. “I seem to remember pinning you down pretty easily that night in Brightmoon…”

“Adora!” Catra’s fur stood on end. “That doesn’t count! I was letting you! Next time you'll see-"

“Am I… interrupting something?” The pair whirled around to find a blue hologram of a tall, bald woman. 

“Light Hope!” Adora stammered. Their trek had led them to an angular metal door in the depths of the cave. “We were just looking for you!”

Light Hope raised a hand to welcome them inside, and the door opened, sliding up and out of view. “Welcome back, Adora. And it seems you have brought a member of your Princess Alliance along too.”

Catra squinted, “what’d she call me?” 

Light Hope continued on, ignoring her. “It has been a long time since you stopped coming to your training sessions. There are still a few lessons left. Would you like to restart them?”

“Not now, Light Hope” Adora said. “Right now we need your help.”

***

A great golden peal of daylight rose over Brightmoon. The sun glinted off the soft edges of the Moonstone, and caught the lining of the Red Knight’s platemail. They stood at the balcony railing, watching over the woods. 

“You called me?” Angella said, appearing at their side.

“Look,” the Knight said, pointing at the treeline, from which emerged ranks of Horde soldiers. 

Angella bowed her head. “They know she’s gone. She-Ra isn’t here to defend us.”

“You can still fight.”

“I fear it will be pointless. We have bastions around Etheria we could flee to-”

“-no,” the Knight said. “No more retreating.”

Angella found herself agreeing. “You do so remind me of someone.” The knight didn’t answer. Angella clicked her fingers, and lance appeared at her side. “If you would lend us your strength, Brightmoon would be in your debt.”

The Red Knight drew their blade, and for the first time, the Queen noticed; it was the Sword of Protection, though old, chipped, and missing its Runestone. 

“Of course,” the Red Knight said.

***

There was no time to collect thoughts - orders were handed down, tanks told to advance, and troops given their positions to defend.

Scorpia waited until no-one was paying attention to her, and slipped out of the ranks to the side of a Horde tank. She knocked twice on the side with a claw. 

Entrapta opened the hatch. “Hello!”

“How are we going in there?”

“What? Oh, good! The Time Bomb seems stable.”

“Shh!” Scorpia glanced nervously at the other Horde soldiers streaming past them. “Let’s try not to blow our cover. What are we supposed to do with this thing again?”

“We need a Runestone,” Entrapta said. “And since we had to leave the Fright Zone, the closest one is… there.” Entrapta pointed behind Scorpia who squinted up at the tower standing in the middle of Lake Brightmoon. “The Moonstone!” said Entrapta. “We need to get close to it!"

***

“I already know of your shaken faith,” Light Hope said, leading Adora deeper into the First-One’s ruin. “You no longer wish to be She-Ra.”

Catra watched quietly as Adora wrestled with the idea. “I don’t know. I do want to do the right thing. And I do a pretty good job as She-Ra, but it just seems like as long as I’m caught in this battle to rebalance Etheria, I can’t be where _I_ want. I can’t find my own balance.” Adora looked at Catra. “All I really want is her.”

“I understand,” Light Hope said, in her flat, halogen accent. “Your mind is clouded by emotion. Just as it was with Mara.”

Adora thought. “You mean Mara was in love too? She failed… because of love?”

“It is complicated,” Light Hope said. “But yes - Mara turned her back on being She-Ra because her own personal feelings got in the way.”

Catra knit her brow. “Hey, Adora? I’ll be honest, this sounds like not great advice.”

“I thought it was too simple." Adora massaged her temples. "All these years - I knew Mara must have had a reason.”

“That is all behind us now,” Light Hope said, turning to face Adora, and dimming the lights in the room. "Now, you are the one with the power. What will you do? Stay with your lover, and abandon the mantle of She-Ra, dooming your world? Or know that you can never be happy yourself, but stay the righteous course, and save Etheria?”

“I don’t have a choice. I can hardly stop being She-Ra.”

“But you can,” Light Hope said, and held out her hands. “Return the sword to me. I will take away your power. You will live out the rest of your life happy, until the Horde wins.”

Adora was stunned. She’d wanted to give up so many times, but never thought she could. She drew her sword, wondering what she wanted. “Catra?” she said. 

“I’m here.”

“What should I do?”

Catra shifted uncomfortably. “How should I know?” She knew what she wanted - Adora to give up the mantle, and to stay with her. 

Adora sighed. “I’ll have to think about it.”

“You do not have time.” Light Hope waved her hand, and a screen appeared, showing them the outside of Castle Brightmoon. “If you wish to stay as She-Ra, you are needed. Make your choice, and make it now.”

“What? No!” Adora stood and watched, shocked, as the Horde’s tanks attacked Castle Brightmoon, and lines of troops advanced through the shallows of the lake.

***

The Red Knight and Angella fought side-by-side. Angella led from the front, and it seemed the Red Knight preferred the thick of battle too. Despite the demands of the conflict, Angella could not shake the familiarity of the Red Knight’s movements, and their occasional use of magic - in showers of red sparks - until she’d finally understood who the knight was. By then, it was too late. 

The knight was a force to be reckoned with. The damaged Sword of Protection was still deadly when swung with force, and scores of the Horde scattered before them. They carved a path to the largest vehicle - the command tank, and stood before it, panting. 

A panel on its underbelly slid open, and a short flight of stairs unfolded. The figure that emerged was tall, tailed by a swirling cape, and heralded by the sinister whine of servos and clinking of sharp steel. Hordak saw the knight, sneered, and spat: "you."

Queen Angella watched as the Horde’s general, and her long-time enemy, raised a hand, and from his palm fired a green bolt of energy. It caught the knight square in the helmet. The red helm spun away into the air, torn in two, and the knight - now unmasked - clutched a shallow laceration on their cheek. 

Angella felt her stomach drop. Though they looked older, Angella knew the fire in the knight’s eyes, and recognised the starry purple hair. “Glimmer!” she called out, and outstretched her wings, taking flight to protect her daughter. 

***

“You may take as much time as you need, Adora.”

Light Hope stood waiting, arm out, palm open, waiting to receive the sword. Adora glanced between the screen and the ancient hologram, sweat beading on her forehead. She looked up at Catra. 

“Do what you have to,” Catra said. 

Adora nodded. “I’ve made a choice.” She drew the Sword of Protection.


	12. Time Bomb: Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second Battle for Brightmoon takes a series of turns.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is! Part two of the finale! I'm posting the epilogue after this too, so keep reading!

“Just a little further!” Entrapta urged from the top of the Moonstone Tower’s corkscrew stairs. Scorpia nodded and ground her teeth with the effort of carrying the Time Bomb up the last few steps. “Perfect!” Entrapta said, tipping it onto its wheels, and riding it out of the stairwell, toward Castle Brightmoon’s Runestone.

“Hold it right there!” 

“Ah!” Entrapta looked up to find Bow in her path, arrow drawn, and ready to fire. Glimmer stood a step behind him, charging magic around her palms. Entrapta winced. “Now, I understand this probably doesn’t look like we’re doing a good thing here…”

Scorpia stumbled out of the door behind her, and waved to Bow and Glimmer, exhausted. “Oh. Hey, guys. How is everything?”

Bow scowled. “Not great. The Horde’s rolling what looks suspiciously like a bomb toward the Moonstone.”

Scorpia balked. “They are? Oh, but we need it for something!”

“Friend Scorpia!” Entrapta cried. “He means us! We look like we’re doing that! And - frankly - I’m glad you brought it up! This is not a bomb.”

Glimmer peered at it. “It says ‘Time Bomb’ on the side of it!”

“That’s just a fun project name!” Entrapta said. She cocked her head at Glimmer. “It’s less of a bomb, and more of a… battery! Anyway, we have to use it to reverse time.”

Bow and Glimmer looked at each other for a beat, before Glimmer asked; “what exactly is going on?”

Entrapta clambered down to the ground. “Allow me to explain!”

***

Below the Moonstone Tower, the battle had fallen quiet. Both sides of the conflict watched their leaders face each other down, and waited to see what would happen next. 

“Well?” Hordak said, appraising the points of his claws. “Do you surrender?” 

Angella stood her ground before him, wings outstretched, spear raised. Behind her, the Glimmer from the future clutched the wound on her brow. She was older, and weathered by the war as it was going to play out; marked by scars of battles that had yet to take place. Slowly and painfully, she gripped her sword behind Angella, and they stood ready to fight back. 

Hordak sneered. “Look at you. Pathetic,” he spat. “Without She-Ra, there is nothing you can do to stop me.”

The Horde’s leader lifted a hand to demonstrate, and at his command, a volley of artillery fired against the castle.

***

“Does that clear things up for you?” Entrapta said, as she wrapped up her explanation. 

Bow hadn’t dropped his arrow, and stood with an aching arm, trying to understand what he and Glimmer had heard. 

Glimmer shook her head. “I understand why you might do this, Entrapta, but why are you going along with this?” she asked, pointing at Scorpia.

“Me? Oh, well. I guess I just mostly thought that… if we turn back time, I might do a better job of protecting Catra the next time around. I feel like I let her down.”

The tower rumbled and shifted below them. “We don’t have time!” Entrapta shouted. “We have to attach the Moonstone as early in the process as possible!”

***

“You see?” Hordak said, but as he tried to point up at the artillery striking the castle walls, something fall from the sky above, in the shallows of the lake. 

From out of the shallows of the lake she rose, seven feet tall, gold hair snapping like a banner in the wind. 

Hordak narrowed his eyes at her, and watched as She-Ra nodded toward Angella, who lifted future Glimmer to safety. The blood from her head wound trickled down and oiled the red plates of armor over her chest.

“I won’t let you do this, Hordak!” She-Ra called. There was a murmur among the Horde in response - they were told She-Ra was gone. 

The Horde leader clenched his fists. “I’ve come too far to be denied!” He leapt at her, and they clashed together in a shower of sparks, reflecting through the shallow water at their feet like inverted stars. 

***

“Will she be okay?” Catra asked Swift Wind, as they soared over the battlefield after dropping She-Ra off. 

“She can handle herself. Besides! We’re in charge of finding the others.”

Catra gazed back down from the alicorn's back to She-Ra, glowing on the edge of the lake. She couldn’t help be feel as though something was wrong.

***

Entrapta was about halfway finished attaching the Time Bomb to the Runestone when something moved behind them. 

“This thing again?” Glimmer said.

Bow looked up sharply. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Entrapta took her goggles off and watched as a shadow near the stairs pooled together and became ghostly apparitions of the four of them, who stalked toward the group menacingly. “Faaaascinating!” she said, and starting taking notes as Bow, Glimmer and Scorpia were forced into defensive positions together.

***

She-Ra drove the point of her blade toward Hordak’s heart, but his talons caught it’s edges, squealing sharply and tearing shallow grooves into the sword. Light poured from the cracks.

They stood locked together, muscles taut, servos whirring beneath Hordak’s armor. Sweat beaded on She-Ra’s forehead. 

Until, from beneath them, a form started to rise. Neither had noticed, so driven as they were to slay each other, that the sky had darkened, and long shadows were being cast over the lake, but by what, no one could see.

The Horde murmured again, but this time there something else was moving beneath the Moonstone Lake’s surface.

There was a moment of total silence before hundreds of shadows began to emerge, and then another moment of confusion before a shade of the dark army rising from the lake reached out and enveloped a soldier, before moving on, leaving only a helmet in its wake.

The Horde’s morale crumbled, and they started to break formation.

“No, you fools!” Hordak screamed, and She-Ra took the opportunity to kick him square in the chest, knocking him away. 

He scrambled to his feet to finish her, but looked up to find her surrounded by shadows, all in different forms. She held the Sword of Protection up to them warily, and they circled her like she was wounded prey. 

Hordak grimaced, and slipped away, seeing his chances dissolving now that these strange and deadly shadows had arrived. He left them to finish her off.

She-Ra watched him go, but couldn’t pursue. Both parties in the battle were retreating, all except for her. She was alone on the field, ringed by shadows as far as they eye could see. They jabbed at her, keeping her on her toes, knocking her back and forth until she lost her grip on the sword and it tumbled to her feet. She-Ra’s light faded.

“Adora,” intoned Light Hope’s electronic voice. Adora looked over her shoulder, and found the blue hologram standing among the shadows with her. “This is why I warned you against this course of action. Your failure to make a decision has doomed both things you wanted to preserve in this timeline - Etheria, and your relationship with Catra. But I have another way.”

***

“Wait,” Catra said to Swift Wind. “Where did she go?”

“Dunno! Not sure if you noticed, pal, but this sudden storm is making it mighty hard to see anything!”

Catra pointed at the lake. “I swear - She-Ra was down there, but the light just went out. We gotta go make sure she’s ok.”

***

“How long until that thing is ready!” Glimmer called to Entrapta. More and more shadows came pouring up the stairs. 

“Just about there…” Entrapta mumbled, making last minute adjustments to the machine’s connections to the Runestone. “You know, these shadows are fascinating! It’s hard to say exactly what they are, but they seem to be attracted to what we’re doing, as though they’re some sort of lifeform attracted to disturbances in spacetime-”

“Just hurry!” Bow shouted over the struggle.

***  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zdFZJf-B90

Light Hope drew a circle with her hand, and a glowing sphere appeared before Adora. The water of the lake became choppy and dark, and the wind rushed around them like a tornado. The orb seemed to draw in the light around it, growing until it was as tall as Adora was, and then it stopped and turned clear, like a window. Through it, Adora could see Castle Brightmoon, as she remembered it to be, years ago.

“I have decided to leave this doomed timeline. I have found us another. It is one where Catra was never taken in by the Horde, and you never grew up with her. Here, you will be free to be She-Ra and restore balance to Etheria, without distraction.”

Adora backed away, shaking her head. The shadows around her howled over the wind at the uncanny portal, and clawed at Adora as she tried to stumble away from it. 

“This time, you do not have a choice,” said Light Hope, and in a flash of light, she was gone, and the portal’s surface turned dark. It started to grow larger again, and while the winds died down for a moment, after seconds they redoubled - now blowing toward the orb. Adora staggered through the water against the gale, trying desperately to avoid being sucked in. 

The shadows wailed and grabbed her arms and legs, weighing her down, but still she drove on through the lake. 

Suddenly, the tide turned against her, and she looked over her shoulder in terror to see that the portal had grown large enough to touch the water’s surface. The lake rushed into the gaping window in space from all directions, trying to drag Adora in. 

“Adora!” 

Adora looked up, gasping for breath, and saw Catra descending from above on Swift Wind’s back, reaching out a hand. The alicorn fought against the wind to stay in place. 

“Catra!” Adora grit her teeth and pushed through the roaring water to stretch toward her grasping hand. Their fingertips brushed, and Adora fell into the current, dragged back a few inches. 

“No!” Catra leaned out of the saddle as far as she could, and gripped Adora’s hand. “Don’t let go of me!”

Catra grit her teeth as she dragged Adora through the cold rapids, the growing portal close behind them. 

***  
Entrapta took her goggles off once again to look at her handiwork, and nodded. It was ready. 

She looked back to the others, and saw them fighting a losing battle. Entrapta knew before long they’d be overcome. “Gosh,” she said. “I hope I’m right about this.” She pulled the lever.


	13. Epilogue: Heads and Tails

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adora and Catra spend the night together.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpQSjf-0Lc8

Adora opened her eyes, and felt a deep flood of relief. 

Catra lay between her arms, curled close to Adora’s heartbeat. They stared at each other a moment. 

“Adora?” Catra said. “What happened? Where are we?”

Adora looked around - they were together in Adora’s bunk, back at the Fright Zone. “We’re home, but I don’t remember how we got here.” She lay back in the bunk and tried to remember where they had been a moment ago.

Catra sat up and stretched. “Who cares. If no-one’s come to find us it means no-one’s looking. Let’s just sleep in.”

Adora touched her face, gently running her hands over her scars. _Okay,_ she thought. _I still have these._

But even though she knew they were important, she couldn’t recall why. It was as though her memories were changing underneath her, like melting ice.

Catra pushed Adora’s hand away from her face, and rolled on top of her, resting her head on Adora’s chest. Adora ran a hand through Catra’s hair, enjoying the warmth. Catra smiled as Adora’s breathing lifted her up and down, and purred.

Adora felt her body heating up. “Catra,” she said. “You’re not asleep are you?”

Catra didn’t open her eyes. “Depends,” she replied. “You wanna ask me something?”

Adora bit her lip and ran a hand down Catra’s back, feeling her shiver in response. Adora’s fingers traced the spine down to the tail, and then she did it over again. Catra arched her back a little. “Mm.”

“You want more?” Adora felt a little gust of bravery, and dragged her nails up Catra’s back, and then gently around her neck. Adora’s heart was start to beat faster, and she felt sure Catra would notice and tease her. Catra trembled under her touch instead, and it was then that Adora felt Catra’s heartbeat against her own, just as quick and panicked. 

Catra opened her eyes and shifted closer, nipping at Adora’s neck as she moved. 

Adora felt the tension in her body ratchet up with each kiss. She sighed and clenched her fists, not wanting to move too fast, but wanting more than anything to move as fast as possible. It was a dance. 

Catra stopped at Adora’s lips, and by then neither could take it any longer. Adora pulled Catra in and felt her fangs in her mouth. 

Catra sat up, breathless. “This is really happening. Is this really happening?” She struggled out of her Horde uniform shirt, before grabbing at the bottom of Adora’s, and lifting it up. 

“I don’t know. Have we done this before?” Adora asked from inside her shirt. 

Catra shook her head and laughed. “We should have. This rules.” She looked down at Adora’s bare chest and forgot how to talk. 

Adora smirked. “You want more?”

“Yeah…”

“Come here.”

As Catra lay down and Adora rolled on top, the pair both knew that something was wrong. But the details were hazy, and the world around them seemed to be fading, until all that mattered was their love for each other. 

Adora pushed her knee between Catra’s legs, and felt adrenaline jump inside her as Catra went red and groaned. “Adora…” she said, voice cracking. “I want-”

***  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwWL6GTK1RA

Adora opened her eyes, and a cold wave of disappointment washed over her. Her shoulders rose and fell as she drew a deep, bitter breath. A dull ache settled in her chest, and as she looked around her room in Castle Brightmoon, she was overcome with a sense of defeat. She put her head in her hands and sobbed quietly to herself.

***

Miles away, in the Fright Zone, Catra had awoken from the same memory, and found herself prowling the rooftops to keep her mind occupied. 

Images of Adora beneath her - and above her - dragged at her heart every time she shut her eyes. Catra ran to the edge of town, to the tower they’d watched the stars from together. The tears caught up with her anyway. 

***

Adora slipped into a shirt and pushed her way out onto the balcony. She looked down at the remains of the battlefield below Castle Brightmoon, and then suddenly her head swam with deja vu. Adora touched her face, and found no scars.

But why was she looking for them? Part of her remembered losing an eye, but then she blinked, and suddenly the idea seemed absurd. She had both eyes now.

Even from as far away as Brightmoon, the lights of the Fright Zone were visible for miles on a clear night. They turned the smog red. Adora looked out, through the mountains, over the wasteland, and knew without a doubt that Catra was looking back. 

Catra stood on their tower, alone, and peered out into the darkness. Even though the light pollution of the Fright Zone meant she could barely see a thing, she knew exactly which direction Adora was in, because she’d sat down one day and figured it out. 

She stared into the gloom, and felt Adora out there, somewhere. She held her arms close to herself, and shook in the cold. 

The gulf between them seemed like the length of the entire world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it for now - thanks so much for reading! I may come back and do some more fics around season 3, but we'll see! Follow me on twitter @dyna_tillo if you want to stay posted just in case i wind up with time to write more smut B) thanks again for reading!


End file.
